


The Forging of the Wolf

by fuzzballsheltiepants



Category: Throne of Glass Series - Sarah J. Maas
Genre: Attempted Sexual Assault, Canon Bisexual Character, Canon-Typical Violence, F/F, F/M, Gay Love, M/M, Multi, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Self-Harm, Sexual Assault, Sexual Content
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-11-14
Updated: 2019-01-01
Packaged: 2019-02-02 08:19:19
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 25
Words: 187,566
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12722991
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fuzzballsheltiepants/pseuds/fuzzballsheltiepants
Summary: Fourteen year old Aedion Ashryver lost everything the day the King of Adarlan slaughtered the Galathynius family.  When he ends up captured by Adarlan forces months later, he tries to figure out not only how to survive in a country that wants to break him, but how to help rally Terrasen against the invading force.





	1. Chapter 1

The young man was dragged before the general, hands shackled behind him, a guard on each arm.  No, not a young man, despite his lanky height; a boy without even down yet growing upon his chin.  A boy with defiance and hatred in his turquoise eyes.  
  
“What is your name, boy?” the general asked.  He said nothing, but held the older man’s stare, tall enough to look slightly down his nose.  He stalked towards him, closing the distance between them in three strides, bristling.  “I said,” he growled, inches from that defiant face, “what is your name.”  When the boy still didn’t speak, he slammed a fist into his abdomen, forcing the golden-haired boy to bend over and pull against the hold on his arms. When he was able to straighten again, he merely set his jaw and stared ahead.  Three blows then, two to the abdomen and one to the ribs, hard enough to bruise bone.  The boy buckled, wheezing for a moment, but when he got his feet under him again he merely looked the general straight in the eye and bared his teeth in a grin.  “You will tell me your name, puppy, or you will die.”    
  
Those cursed eyes dared him to do it.  There was a wildness under this boy’s skin he had never seen before.  He wondered what had caused Erik to capture rather than kill him, and that question kept his hand off his dagger.  Instead, he turned as if going to walk away, then spun and slammed his fist into the boy’s jaw.  He had knocked grown men unconscious more than once with that blow, often shattering bone, but though the boy fell back against his guards he returned to his feet within seconds.  Glaring, he spat at the general’s feet, bloody saliva spraying on his boots.  The general looked at the guards.  “Throw him in the holding pit,” he ordered, and spun on his heel to find Erik and learn what the hell he was thinking.  
  
*****  
  
Erik ducked into the tent and stood at attention until the general acknowledged him.  While he didn’t particularly like Erik, he did respect him as being a very effective war camp leader.  His men followed him unquestioningly, and Erik’s loyalty to Adarlan was beyond doubt.  
  
“You wished to see me sir?”  
  
The general gestured to the seat opposite him and Erik sat.  “What’s the story with that whelp you brought in today?”  
  
“Sir?”  
  
“That young son of Hellas with a death wish.”  
  
Erik flushed slightly and his expression became mildly defensive.  “He was one of the fighters on the periphery, sir.  Fighting in a group of Rhoe Galathynius’s former men.  When the last of Galathynius’s men fell, he just stood over the body and kept fighting.  Gutted one of my men, injured a couple of others pretty badly before Marcus managed to get a blow to his temple.”  
  
“So why capture him?  Seems like an arrow to the throat would’ve saved a lot of trouble.”  
  
Erik was silent for a moment, then replied, “Because if he can fight like that as just a boy, if he can be broken, he could be invaluable to us.  A son of Terrasen, fighting for Adarlan?  That could be a very powerful symbol.”  
  
The general shook his head.  “Men like that can’t be broken.  You should have killed him.”  
  
“All due respect, sir,” Erik replied, “every man can be broken.”  
  
The general mulled that over.  “Well, I’ll leave him here with you to do as you see fit.  If you succeed in turning him, send him my way.  If not, hang him and leave his body for the crows.  That will also be a powerful symbol.”  
  
“Indeed.”  Erik stood to leave.  
  
“Do you know his name?  He refused to tell me.”  
  
“No, sir.  But I do know Rhoe Galathynius had a protege, some kin of his wife’s.  Don’t know anything else about him, but he sure fought like someone taught by Galathynius.”  
  
Interesting.  He nodded his dismissal and Erik slipped out of the tent.  He thought about going to talk to the boy again, but shook his head and returned to his maps.  He needed to move on to the next camp tomorrow, and from now on the silent, defiant boy was Erik’s problem.  
  
*****  
  
Erik stalked away from the general’s tent, heading straight for the stone-lined pit they used to hold particularly challenging prisoners.  He passed the corral that the rest of the conquered people sat in, a few keening but most just numb and silent with despair.  Terrasen had been more challenging to conquer than had been expected, especially since the entire Galathynius family had been slaughtered all those months ago.  But those gods-damned Lords had done a surprisingly effective job of rallying their once-considerable military might.  Six thousand of them had died yesterday, more than two thirds of their total force.  Enough to end this at last, he hoped.  Even though the camp was miles from the battlefield, he could smell the smoke from the pyres.  As clever as those Lords might be, they would never overcome the might of the King of Adarlan.  
  
Reaching the pit, he looked at the guard who was sitting on the wooden lid.  The other guard had snapped to attention as soon as he had appeared.  
  
“What do you think you’re doing?” he snapped.  
  
“Keeping the prisoner contained, sir,” the guard replied respectfully.  Erik tried to recall his name.  
  
“He can’t climb out of that pit.”  
  
The standing guard, Deaghall, cleared his throat.  “Excuse me, sir, but he actually can.  He almost made it out before we managed to get the lid secure.”  
  
Holy gods.  “How long has he been in there?”  
  
“Two hours, sir.”  
  
Erik thought about the heat, about the brutal march from the battlefield, and about the various bruises and wounds the bastard had sustained.  They had dragged the boy shackled behind a horse, as he refused to walk any other way, and had kept him moving at a brisk enough clip he couldn’t start anything.  He calculated when he should pull him out of there  
  
“Come and get me at sundown,” he ordered, and left to deal with processing the other prisoners of war.  He hated this paperwork, but the King was adamant he be informed about every captured enemy.  Many of them would end up being sentenced to Endovier for any war crimes they may have committed; some would be integrated into Adarlan; and some would be allowed to return to their homes.  Cal Lochan had already gone to the chopping block; so had many of the other most influential warriors and Lords.  Nearly all of King Orlon’s most loyal people had died, either slaughtered in the initial purge or on the battlefield.  The rest just needed to be smoked out and destroyed.  Starting with that hard-eyed whelp in the pit.  
  
*****  
  
The boy sat in the dark.  There was not a single part of him that didn’t hurt, so he had given up cataloguing his injuries.  The pounding in his head was the most unbearable, that and the dry rawness in his throat.  He was almost grateful for the dark as he wasn’t sure his eyes could have handled sunlight.  At least those bastards had shackled his hands in front of him before lowering him into the pit.  
  
Resting his shoulders against the cool stone, a slight reprieve from the stuffy heat of the air, images from the past three days ran through his mind.  Darrow’s reedy voice ordering him to the rear guard, only to fight should the battle go very, very wrong.  He was supposed to be safer there.  Since he wasn’t slaughtered on the first day, he guessed that had been true.  Quinn, laughing wonderful Quinn, standing steely-eyed next to him, sword at the ready, waiting for the fighting to reach them without a trace of hope or humor in his face.  The metallic stench of blood and mud and piss shoving its way up his nostrils, somehow in keeping with the clashing of swords and shields and the shouts and screams of dying men coming from below them.  When darkness finally fell, the killing fields had gone almost silent as the two sides retreated, both having taken heavy casualties, only a breath before the fighting would begin again.  The boy closed his eyes and pressed his head against the rock behind him as the sound of crackling flame echoed in his memory.  Adarlan’s forces had gotten around the guard and set fire to a third of the tents the soldiers were resting in, then stood surrounding the camp slaughtering anyone who emerged.  Darrow had ordered him and Quinn and a small contingent of men to flee and they had - only to run right into an ambush as dawn broke.  His own scream as the arrow had gone through Quinn’s throat would never leave his ears.  He still didn’t know why they hadn’t sent another through his own.  He wished they had.    
  
So he sat in the dark, waiting, the names of his beloved dead pounding in his head.  
  
*****  
  
It was well past sunset before Erik finally had finished recording the names and villages of all the prisoners.  This list would be cross-checked against Adarlan’s main list of important members of the resistance.  He strode back to the pit, exhaustion nagging at him.  This boy was probably more trouble than he was worth.  Maybe he should just kill him; a part of him still didn’t know why he’d spared him, why that voice had whispered to him that he must be saved.    
  
He nodded to the guards, and Deaghall, who had been sitting on the lid, stood stiffly and they pulled it back.  Erik leaned over, using his torch to illuminate the depths of the pit.  The boy was blinking at them in the sudden light, face bruised and swollen, his clothes wet and torn.  “Well, boy, I’m here to give you a second chance,” he said.  Deaghall dropped a rope down into the pit.  “Climb up, son.”  He didn’t move, didn’t even get to his feet.  Erik considered his options.  The boy hadn’t had water for at least a day, and who knew when he had last eaten.  It was entirely possible he was too weak to stand.  He walked over to the taller guard, Cesan was his name, and said in a low voice, “I want you to go in there and get him.  We may need to tie the rope around his wrists to haul him up, he’s probably too spent.  But don’t drop your guard.”  Cesan nodded, then took the rope and lowered himself into the pit.  Going to the boy, he grabbed him roughly by the back of the shirt and hauled him to his feet, the boy working to get his legs under him rather than resisting.  Good, Erik thought, maybe he was smarter than he seemed.  As Cesan turned his back to him to grab the rope, the boy moved, faster than should have been possible, and looped his shackles around the older man’s neck, pulling back as he crossed his wrists, cutting of Cesan’s air.  Deaghall cried out in alarm, but Cesan was no fool.  He stomped his heel hard on the boy’s instep, causing him to loosen his grip involuntarily.   An elbow to the belly had him doubling over, and Cesan spun and jabbed the heel of his hand at the boy’s nose.  He managed to dodge that blow by some miracle, taking it on the cheekbone instead, but his brief surge of energy was spent.  Had he been a little older, a little more experienced, Erik thought, the guard would have been dead.  Shaking his head, a wry expression on his seasoned face, Cesan dragged him to the rope and bound it around his wrists, then nodded to Erik and Deaghall.  With the two of them pulling and Cesan pushing, they managed to haul the boy up over the edge.  He stood there for a moment, hands braced on his knees, before straightening on steady legs while Deaghall lowered the rope back for Cesan to climb out.  
  
“You’re a fool,” Erik said, staring right into those turquoise eyes.  The boy merely stared back, unblinking, the look more animal than human.  Erik found himself somewhat unnerved, but this was why he couldn’t bring himself to kill the whelp.  This ferocity, the depths of his reserves.  What would the world lose if he died?  What might he become if he could be brought to Adarlan’s side?  He turned away, gesturing to Cesan and Deaghall to bring the prisoner.  Once in his tent, he sat on his chair and rested his ankle on his knee, studying the creature who was now standing before him.  “What. Is. Your. Name.”  
  
Somehow that gods-damned boy smiled at him through his cracked, swollen lips.    
  
In a flash, Erik was on him, dagger in his hand.  Cesan grabbed the boy’s thick hair and yanked his head back, then kicked his knees out from under him, but those eyes never left Erik’s face.  He pressed the dagger against the boy’s throat; he didn’t so much as flinch.  No, instead he started to laugh, a hoarse, eerie sound.  “You don’t fear death, do you, whelp.”  The laughter continued.  Not only didn’t fear it, but perhaps craved it.  But maybe…  Pushing past the guards and ducking through the flaps of the tent, Erik strode for the prisoners’ corral.  If the boy wouldn’t yield for his own life, perhaps he would for another’s.    
  
He walked through the clusters of prisoners curled up on the ground trying to find a few moments’ rest, scanning the faces.  Heads rose at his approach, then flattened back down to the ground, hoping to remain unnoticed.  A girl caught his eye, probably thirteen or fourteen years old, her breasts just budding, tangled dark hair falling over her pretty, dirty face.  He grabbed her arm and yanked her roughly from the ground, and she began to scream.  The sound of his dragger being drawn shut her up, but her mother had leaped to her feet and began to cry, clutching at his arm.  “Take me,” she wailed, “don’t hurt my daughter.  Please, please, sir.”  He ignored the woman, and the other prisoners who were sitting up to gawk, all the way to the gate and through it, the guards closing the gate on her weeping.  The girl was trembling but compliant, no doubt hoping obedience would earn her mercy.  Too bad for her it wasn’t her obedience being tested.  
  
The boy had returned to his feet by the time he shoved the girl through the flaps.  He studied the girl impassively, no sign of emotion on his face.  Erik spun the girl so her back was against him and held his knife to her throat.  Tears poured down her face, wetting his hand, and she was shaking so hard he thought she might accidentally slit her own throat.  The boy’s nostrils flared but otherwise there was no change to his expression.  “Do you wish to condemn this girl to suffer because of your arrogance?” Erik snarled.  “Shall I spill her throat upon the ground?  Will that make you talk?”  He didn’t actually want to kill the girl; not only would it cause a pile of more paperwork, but he thought it would actually hurt his chances of making headway with the freak of nature before him.  Still, there were other methods that he had seen be effective over his decades as a soldier for Adarlan…Sheathing his knife, he dragged her the two steps across his tent and threw her down on the cot, yanking her skirt up as he did so.  She screamed in sheer terror and tried to leap up, no doubt to try to run, but he backhanded her across the face and she fell back again, hand automatically going to her cheek, subsiding into silent sobs.  
  
Erik turned his head to stare at the boy.  “I want you to know, that everything I do to this girl is going to be your fault,” he said in a low growl.  “You have the power to stop this.”  Turning back to the girl, he yanked her skirt up again and tore her cheap underwear off.  She barely even had any hair.  As he knelt between her knees and began unbuckling his belt, she tried to surge up again and he shoved her down.  Gritting his teeth, he finished with the belt and started on the buttons on his pants.  He was not one of those men who got their jollies from children.  Or from terror.  No, he preferred his women full-figured and enthusiastic, but he was counting on the tall boy breaking under the prospect of this random girl being violated.  Unfortunately, the silence behind him was deafening.  Slipping his hand into his open pants, he gripped his flaccid organ.  As much as he felt nauseated at the prospect of forcing this girl, he knew the impact it could have, the statement of what he was willing to do, the measures he would go to.  Shifting his knees, he forced the girl’s thighs wider, trying not to look at what was now spread before him, and leaned forward, pressing a hand on her shoulder.  Her whole body was vibrating, her eyes closed, her lips moving in what might have been a prayer to some forsaking god.  
  
“Aedion,” came a rasping voice from behind him.  Erik froze, uttering an internal prayer of thanks, then looked over his shoulder at the boy.  “Aedion Ashryver.”  A jolt went through him at that name, and he could see that Cesan and Deaghall recognized it as well.  He pushed roughly off the cot, swiftly buttoning his pants, and turned to face him fully.    
  
“Aedion Ashryver.  Well, well, well, look sharp, men,” he sneered.  “We have a prince among us.”  He should have known, really; those vivid eyes with that gold ring around the pupil should have given it away, but he had forgotten or never known that Rhoe Galathynius’s protege was more than just a talented kid.  “How old are you, Aedion?”    
  
He thought for a second the prince wouldn’t answer, and took a step back towards the girl.  “Fourteen,” came the quiet response.  Holy gods.  To be fourteen years old and that skilled… And a boy of fourteen would no doubt be much easier to turn than had he been the seventeen he had taken him for.  The gods had indeed stayed his hand.  Erik jerked his head at the trembling wretch behind him.  “Take her back to the corral.  And don’t touch her.”  The men nodded and Deaghall grabbed her arm and hauled her to her feet, helping her straighten her skirt, and she carried herself with as much dignity as she could muster out of the tent.  Once they were out of earshot, he stalked to Aedion and put a hand on his shoulder, leaning in close.  “I want you to remember tonight,” he said low in his ear.  “I want you to know that Adarlan has won, and that if you cooperate with us, you can do more to protect your countrymen than if you fight us and die.  Because if you fight us, you will die.  And then may Hellas have mercy on Terrasen.”  
  
Aedion looked straight in his eye - one of the few in camp tall enough to do so - and gave a small nod.  “Understood.”  
  
Erik walked out of the tent to the edge of the woods and vomited.  When he straightened, wiping his mouth, the Ashryver prince was watching him from just outside the tent, an unfathomable expression in those peculiar eyes.  


	2. Chapter 2

It was the aching of his empty stomach that dragged Aedion reluctantly from sleep.  He had been dreaming of following a voice through trees in the dark, a laughing child’s voice that he could barely hear over rushing water.  No matter how fast he ran, the voice kept getting farther and farther away, until it disappeared entirely.  And though his heart was breaking at the loss of that voice, just as he was about to throw himself into the water after it, another came and made him pause.  A mature, female voice, that merely said, “She lives.”  The dream had shifted then, to Rhoe and a dream he had had many times in the past months.  This one had a basis in memory, the two of them sparring, Rhoe pausing occasionally to correcting his footwork or his grip.  As always, the dream ended with Rhoe asking, “Do you know what your most important weapon is?”  Every time, he woke with that question on his lips, but the answer never came.  Now he had that second voice, the one that give him a tiny spark of hope, echoing behind the question.  Even if he knew that any hope was false.   
  
Something smelled wrong.  Though the musty smell of canvas mixed with mud and piss was universal in the war camps, there was a different note to it.  As that intruded onto his consciousness, he wondered why everything hurt.  Then he shifted and the shackles connecting his ankles and wrists clanked and pulled and he remembered.  He kept his eyes closed, sorting through the various sounds and scents drifting towards him.  He was alone on a slightly too short cot in a tent.  There was a guard outside.  Faint sounds of people beginning to stir were audible, and he thought he might not be imagining the distant warm scent of coffee.  Stifling his groan, he pulled himself into a sitting position and scanned his surroundings.  The rosy light of dawn came through the gap in the tent, which was so small he wouldn’t be able to stand upright in it.  The other cot was empty and looked as if it hadn’t been slept in at all.  In fact, there were only the barest traces of scents other than his own.  He wondered who the prior occupants had been, what had happened to them.  If either of them had been among the people he and Quinn had killed before Quinn had dropped at his feet and he had been taken.  With a surge of bile in his throat he remembered the feel of his sword plunging deep into a belly, the reverberation when the blade had barked against bone.   He rubbed his hands over his face, though his chains were short enough he had to bend his head to do it.  Pressing his fingers into his eyes, he took a deep breath and felt stabbing pain in his ribs.  The nausea subsided and with that his hunger and thirst surged.  They had fed him the previous night, a little meat and bread, but it was scant fare given how long he had gone without.  
  
He got to his feet slowly, not wanting to hit the dirt if he rose too quickly while this light-headed.  There was a pitcher of water on the small table between the cots, and he poured a glass, then struggled to drink it due to the shortness of his chains.  Bastards.  He finally figured out that if he curled up on his cot he could manage to drink with only a little spillage.  After draining the pitcher his head cleared and he shuffled to the tent opening.  The guard turned, hand on his sword hilt, as he pushed through the flaps.    
  
“The prince emerges,” the man said sarcastically.  Aedion straightened to his full height and looked silently down at the guard.  The smaller man snorted.  “Lord Breiner requests your presence, Prince Ashryver.”  There was a distinct sneer in the tone.  “Follow me.”  He strode off at a rapid clip that Aedion struggled to match with his shackles.  Curious eyes turned to him as they passed by the ordinary soldiers who were going about their morning business.  The camp rhythms were no different than those he was used to - people eating, cleaning weapons, bantering, just as he had been a few days prior with a different flag overhead.  He glared at the crimson and gold wyvern that flew over the largest tent, the one they were heading to.  They passed by a tall fence, spiked on the top, and he could hear people moving and murmuring on the far side.  Prisoners.  He wondered why he was not among them.    
  
As they approached the big tent, its guard nodded to the man he was following.  “He’s expecting you, you can go right in.”  Aedion ducked into the tent behind his guide and straightened when he recognized the man from the night before.  The man who had been willing to torture an innocent girl just to get Aedion’s name, but who had vomited his guts up afterwards.  He didn’t know what to make of that, of him.    
  
“Well, puppy,” the brown-haired man said, gesturing to a chair.  Aedion sat down, eyeing the man warily.  “We just received word that the Terrasen Lords have surrendered and are suing for peace.  Your country now belongs to Adarlan.”  The words hit him like a physical blow.  For Darrow to surrender to the man who had killed King Orlon, for his countrymen to now be subjected to the whims of the monster in Rifthold…  “This means,” Breiner went on, “that you now officially belong to Adarlan.  General Paget just left to go aid in the negotiations of the surrender, but he ordered me to write to the King and ask what to do with you.  Technically, you may be considered next in line to the crown, since Rhoe Galathynius had no siblings and no surviving children.”  
  
No surviving children.  The words hit him like stones, and for the second time that morning, bile stung Aedion’s throat.  That voice he had been following in his dream…  He rallied his strength, willing his agony not to show in his face.  “My understanding,” he forced out, “is that in the absence of a Galathynius ruler, the leadership of the country is turned over to the Lords.  I am not heir.  I am nothing to anyone who remains in Terrasen.”    
  
Breiner’s face was skeptical.  “That seems hard to believe, given the lengths they went to try to get you out.”  
  
“Only because of my age.  Lord Darrow didn’t want me there at all but we needed every available sword.”  
  
“And yet it did your people no good in the end.”  
  
Aedion clenched his teeth and counted to ten to keep from rising to the bait.  “What am I to do here?”  
  
“Sir.”  
  
“Excuse me?”  
  
“You are to address me as Lord or Sir.  You are a prisoner of war and a member of my camp now.  Don’t make me remind you with another demonstration.”  He turned his attention to the papers in front of him in dismissal.    
  
Taking a deep, painful breath, Aedion asked, almost managing to keep the insolence out of his voice, “What am I supposed to do here, sir?”  
  
Breiner did not look up from his paperwork.  “Iain will show you.  You will help with camp maintenance, and you are expected to join us for training.  You may go now.”  
  
The guard - Iain, he supposed - gestured to him to follow, a smirk on his narrow face.  He hesitated for just a moment before obeying.  Thankfully, Iain said little as he brought them to the camp mess and removed the chain linking his hands to his feet, though he left the shackles on.  Aedion laid into the porridge, salt pork, and bread like a man starving.  Which, he supposed, he was.  When he finally surfaced for air, he realized Iain and several other soldiers were staring at him, mouths agape.   
  
“What?” he asked, spraying a few crumbs.  
  
“Leave some food for the rest of the soldiers,” Iain said.    
  
With the edge finally taken off his hunger, Aedion leaned back a little, stretching his long legs out in front of him with minimal clanking from the shackles, and took a leisurely bite of an apple.   Looking the guard up and down as he chewed, he allowed a slow smile to spread across his face.  “I’m twice your size, midget,” he drawled, “it makes sense I should eat twice as much.”    
  
Iain grinned and flicked his eyes to Aedion’s groin.  “I’m not sure you want to go comparing sizes there, whelp,” he replied, “at least not till your balls have dropped.”  
  
This was familiar, no different than the usual verbal sparring that took place at every camp.  “If you wanted to see my balls, you should’ve just asked.  Though I’m not sure you’d even recognize real ones if you saw them.”  Everybody chuckled, and one of the soldiers - the shorter guard from the night before - gave him a friendly punch on the shoulder.   A part of him hated them for their easy acceptance of him after they had been involved in the destruction of his kingdom.  A larger part of him hated himself for seeking it.   
  
His job for the morning was helping clean up the mess, a task that would have been much easier were he not still restricted by the chains, which kept catching on the tables and chairs.  Iain then fetched him and showed him the way to the weapons master to join a couple of the other boys in cleaning the weapons.  The sight and smell of the dried blood of his countrymen embedded in the blades and hilts made him want to use these blades to destroy every single one of the soldiers in the camp.  The master watched him closely as he stood staring at them, nostrils flaring, trembling fists clenching and unclenching as he tried to gain control of himself.  
  
“It’s all right, son,” the man finally said.  “How about you oil the clean ones.”  The other boys were pretending not too be paying attention, but their eyes kept flicking to him over their task.  Gritting his teeth, he picked his way over to the end of the bench and sat, picking up the freshly cleaned blade the boy next to him had just set down.  The master set down a bottle of oil and a cloth, and Aedion stared at it for a moment before taking a deep breath and reaching for them.  He ignored the other boys, concentrating on the familiar task, ensuring the right amount of oil coated each fresh blade.  When the bell rang for lunch, the other two leaped to their feet and ran to the mess.  Aedion finished the dagger he had been working on and carefully placed in on the designated rack before looking towards the man who had been studying his work.    
  
“Nice job, you know how to properly care for a blade.”  He shook his head, disapproval spreading across his wrinkled face.  “Most boys want to swing them but don’t want to bother with making sure they’re fit for the job.  You’ve been trained well.  Go ahead on to lunch, now.  You look like you could use some food.”  Aedion nodded, his stomach growling loudly in agreement.  As he passed by, the man dropped a gnarled hand on his arm.  “It gets easier,” he said quietly.  Aedion shot him a questioning look but it was ignored.  After a long moment, he turned and shuffled towards the mess, and when he glanced over his shoulder the weapons master was just standing there, head bowed, staring at nothing.  
  
After lunch, he was sent to the training area.  There were half a dozen other boys there, the youngest probably twelve, the oldest maybe sixteen or seventeen, and a few older men.  He was surprised there weren’t more given the size of the camp, but then recalled this place was not intended for training, but for an extermination.  Likely the boys were all sons of the higher-ranking warriors. Not able to do anything with his hands and feet still shackled, he sat on the slope overlooking the area and watched the warmup.  The men ignored him, while the boys kept glancing his way.  He scoffed at their lack of concentration.  Rhoe would’ve had his head for it.  Pulling his knees up to his chest and resting his chin on them, he studied their sloppy footwork.  He felt a man come up next to him. He could smell it was Breiner, but deliberately did not acknowledge him.    
  
“What do you think?” came the older man’s tenor voice.  
  
“They lack discipline,” Aedion replied.  He waited a beat, then added, “Sir.”  
  
There was a pause, then, “Would you care to elaborate?”  
  
He snorted and gave a shrug.  “They keep gaping at me like I’m some exotic animal.  If they can’t concentrate here, when it’s quiet, how will they manage it in battle?  Plus their footwork is terrible.”  His mind flashed to the memory of the ground slippery with blood, the screams and groans of dying men around him, and how it felt to let all that become just a faint buzz as he brought his sword down on the shield of an unknown Adarlanian soldier.  How automatic it had been to keep his feet moving, to attack and retreat as if it were all a well-learned dance.    
  
Breiner sat down next to him.  “It so happens I agree with you.  It can be a challenge to keep so few boys disciplined.  I think it’s easier when they’re in a training camp with large numbers.”  
  
“There were but a handful of us when I was training.”  He didn’t add that for the year before the assassinations it had been just he and Ren working so closely with Rhoe and his men.  Dark-haired, angry Ren, now also gone to the chopping blocks with the entire Allsbrook family.  The boys below moved on to working with practice swords, and while they paid better attention, their footwork still made them vulnerable.  He shook his head in disgust, and then noticed Breiner was studying him rather than the practice.    
  
“If I undo those shackles, will you go down and train with them?”  
  
Aedion sorted through his thoughts for a moment.  He knew why Breiner was asking rather than ordering, that the camp lord was hoping to use him as a means of pushing the boys to work harder.  He didn’t know how he felt about making his enemy better.  At the same time, he would need to keep working or he’d lose ground.  Most of his body still hurt, not as fiercely as in the morning, but likely the increased movement would do nothing but help.  He also needed to figure out the dynamics here, what type of a leader this man beside him was. “What happened to that girl?”  
  
“What girl?”  
  
He was a bastard for not remembering.  “The girl you were willing to torture to get me to talk.”  
  
“She’s back in the corral with her family, I assume,” he said indifferently.  
  
“Who are the prisoners?  Why was she among them?”  
  
Breiner shrugged.  “Most of them are villagers we took as we marched to battle.  I would guess she was one of those.  A few are soldiers who lay down their arms.”  
  
“Why take the villagers?”  
  
Another shrug.  “They were in danger where they were, should the battle be pushed back, and we wanted some leverage.  Plus now it lets us sort through who might be a danger to us at our leisure.  The rest will be released.”  
  
“When?”  
  
“Eventually.”  
  
Bastard, bastard, bastard.  “I’ll train with the others, if I can check on the prisoners personally.”  
  
Breiner looked at him, nonplussed.  “I can order you to train.”  
  
“Yes, but if you are looking for me to show these fools how to work properly, you need me to want to cooperate.”  
  
“Or I can just throw you back in the pit.”  
  
“You could do that.”  He slid his gaze back to the boys fumbling around on the turf in front of him.  Gods, they were terrible.  How the hell did Adarlan conquer everything if they couldn’t train better than this?  
  
Breiner’s voice intruded on this thoughts.  “If you do as I ask, you can go and check on the prisoners.  With a guard.”  
  
Aedion did not reply, merely held his hands out for Breiner to unlock his shackles.  The camp lord pulled a key out of his pocket, then looked at him before unlocking them.  “I want you to go through a basic warmup, then spar with whoever they order you to.  Show us what you can do.”  He inserted the key into first one manacle, then the other; they thudded to the ground, and he began rolling his wrists, then his shoulders as the lord freed his ankles.  He tried to hide the tightness of his muscles as he stood and walked down the slight hill, pausing at the edge to begin stretching.  A glance up the hill showed Breiner’s focus pinned on his every movement.  He’d have to make this good.  
  
*****  
  
Erik watched the gangly boy shake off his stiffness, his movements slowly becoming more fluid.  He was a clever one, to not just leap at the chance to be free of his shackles, but to negotiate to see the prisoners.  Erik wished he hadn’t told the general the prince’s true identity.  While he still believed every man could be broken, he had realized the night before as he had vomited in the woods that he didn’t want to break this one.  He wanted to convert him.  He had watched him surreptitiously all day as he quickly found a foothold with the men and did his work efficiently and well despite his shackles.  Talking to him now, seeing him put his finger so adeptly on the weaknesses of the young trainees, only served to strengthen his belief this boy could be made into Adarlan’s greatest general if he could be won over.  
  
Unfortunately, now that the King would learn who the blue-eyed, golden-haired young giant was, he doubted he’d have a chance.  It was only a matter of time before the King either took him to be broken or killed him.  Ashryver began footwork drills, and now the boys blatantly stopped their work to watch him.  Even the instructors did.  Erik couldn’t blame them.  Despite his lanky height, the boy moved as if he was dancing, every step precise, clean.  It suddenly struck Erik that the boy hadn’t had a chance to get cleaned up or even gotten fresh clothes; his own were filthy and torn, and it was difficult from here to tell what marks on his face were dirt and what were bruises.  He’d have to make sure the boy got a chance to bathe, and he’d have to find him some clothes.  
  
Just as he’d asked, Manas, the main instructor, paired Ashryver up with Burr once he was warmed up and ready to get to work with his wooden practice sword.  He was surprised to see the boy handle the sword with his left hand; he hadn’t paid attention when he’d come in at the end of the boy’s stand over the fallen Terrasen warrior’s body, but the way he did his footwork he would have thought him to be right-handed.  Burr was not quite as tall as the prince but much thicker and more muscled, having just turned seventeen.  He was also their most aggressive fighter, and the least likely to be interested in finesse.  Manas had expressed concern when he had recommended the pairing, thinking the age and weight difference might pose an issue, but Erik had merely replied, “It would do Burr good to get beaten into the dirt,” and Manas had let it go.  
  
The two boys circled each other, then Burr moved in, as usual his aggression destroying his footwork and with it his balance.  Aedion simply stepped to the side, deflected Burr’s blade, and then smacked him on the ass with the flat of his own as the boy blew past him.  Burr was furious, whirling on the taller boy, trying to get the wooden blade into his neck, but Aedion dodged with ease and used his momentum against him, dumping him in the dirt just as Erik had predicted.  Manas and the other instructors were covering their mouths with their hands.  Erik could see Burr saying something to Aedion as he rose from the dirt, but couldn’t hear what the latter replied.  Whatever it was, it must have been good, because Burr launched on him in an all-out assault.  Aedion met the charge, blocking the blow and twisting his weapon so that he forced the blade out of Burr’s hand.  When Burr stupidly lunged at him, bare-handed, Aedion simply stepped into the rush, jabbing with an elbow just below the sternum.  The older boy hit the dirt again, gasping like a fish, the wind knocked out of him.  Aedion loomed over him, looking down in disgust, and Erik thought he heard him say in that still-changing voice, “Now this time, stay down.”  Sitting up on his hill, Erik began to grin.    
  
Ashryver went to Manas, dipped his head respectfully, and thanked him for the match; Manas told him next time they’d find him a better partner.  He returned the sword to the rack, and walked up to where Erik was still sitting.  “I didn’t realize you were left-handed,” Erik said.  
  
“I’m not,” the boy replied.  “Now, when can I see the prisoners?”  
  
*****  
  
An hour after the sparring match that was so pathetic it barely counted, Aedion was finally clean and was wearing some of Breiner’s old clothes.  They were a little big in the shoulders and the waist, but at least they were long enough.  The short guard from the night before, Deaghall, had replaced the shackles on his wrists and ankles and now brought him to the gate of the prisoner’s corral.  As they walked over, the small man asked, “So, is everyone in there going to go all ga-ga because there’s a bona fide prince among them?”   
  
Aedion snorted.  “Hardly.  None of these people are going to have any clue who I am.”  
  
Deaghall looked at him in astonishment.  “The people won’t recognize a prince of their realm?”  
  
“I’m not a prince of their realm,” he replied.  “I’m a prince of Wendlyn.  Here I’m just a relative of the massacred royal family.  Maybe if we were closer to Orynth I might at least be recognized, but out here?”  He shook his head.  
  
Deaghall nodded to the two fellow guards who opened the gate, and then followed Aedion through.  Most of the people were sitting on the ground in small groups, some leaning against the fence.  The low murmur of voices hushed when Aedion and Deaghall were noticed, and the people largely seemed to shrink back.  Aedion strode as boldly as his shackles would allow, keen eyes looking for any signs of the people being mistreated.  The slop buckets were overfull, the stench pronounced enough his eyes watered.  There were no cots or bedrolls, but there was a well at the far end with a bucket and ladle.  “Are they being fed?” he asked in an undertone.  Deaghall bristled.  “Of course they’re being fed.  Ask any one of them.”  
  
One of the older men, grizzled and bent, met Aedion’s eye.  He crouched down close to him.  “Are you okay?” he asked in a low voice.  The man nodded, his still-clear eyes tear bright.  “Are you getting enough food?”  
  
“Yes, Prince,” the man said in a husky voice.  Aedion dropped his head at the honorific.  He had sincerely not thought he would be recognized, and the hope in the man’s face broke his heart.  He was powerless to help these people, they were at the mercy of Breiner and Adarlan now, and while he might have some reason for faith in the former, he had no trust in the latter.  Even with Breiner, he knew these people’s lives were worth less than his own cooperation.  He raised his face to the man again, and took his outstretched hand, giving it a gentle squeeze.    
  
Around the corral he went, chins dropping all around him, some pressing fingers to their lips.  There were tears in his own eyes now.  Pausing here and there to say a few words of sympathy, to squeeze a shoulder, he went to nearly every person in that pen.  One woman stood up and wrung his hand, crying “Thank you, thank you.”  He opened his mouth to ask her why, but then saw sitting behind her, cheek bruised and eyes wide, the girl from the night before.  Pulling away from the woman he assumed was her mother, he knelt before the girl and gently took her hand.    
  
“Is there anything I can do for you?” he asked softly, and the tears rolled down her face as she shook her head.  He touched her bruised cheek gently, the moisture wicking onto his fingertips.  “I’m sorry,” he said, “I’m so sorry.”  Then everyone around him was reaching for him, just brushing fingers against his arms, his hair.  He didn’t understand.  He was just as lost and trapped as they were, just as conquered.  He had failed to save anyone who meant anything to him but these people, these prisoners of war…he could see hope flare in their eyes as they touched him.  
  
When Deaghall cleared his throat and the prisoners backed away, Aedion stood slowly.  He felt the guard’s hand on his back, guiding him through the gate, then back to his tent, but he wasn’t really seeing his surroundings.  Sitting on his cot, all he could think of was Aelin, his tiny cousin, crackling with flame and passion and joy.  If only he had ridden out when Orlon had been assassinated, maybe he could have saved that bright flame from being drowned in the river.  Maybe in doing so, he could have saved Terrasen.  But she was gone, small body lost to the icy water, and his heart and hope with her.  Still, somebody had to stand for Terrasen.  Somebody had to protect his country, even now that its lords had given up, even now that it belonged to Adarlan.  For those people who had pressed gentle hands to a fellow prisoner who maybe somehow still represented the glory of a kingdom, he would have to try.  
  
He had nothing sharp with him, so he sank his own teeth into his palm until blood welled.  Clenching his fist, he allowed three drops to hit the dirt between his feet, and he swore his vow to Terrasen, to Aelin, to Rhoe and Orlon and Evalin and Quinn.  To the old man and the young girl now a mere hundred hards away.  He would do whatever he had to to protect its people, their people.  His people.  If he had to sell himself to Adarlan, he would do so.  If he had to lie or kill or steal, if he had to become another person entirely, he would not fail them as he had failed his family.  He would find a way. 


	3. Chapter 3

Aedion shifted the pack on his back and squinted up at the fort that towered up the hill above him as he sucked down some water from his skin.  The sun had dropped just low enough in the sky to glare over the spiked tops of the protective walls, and they probably still had an hour’s climb before they reached it.  Breiner had been distant the whole trip down, over the border into Adarlan, the grudging bond they had been forming at the war camp thinning until it had all but disappeared.  Indeed, Aedion had been nearly silent for the ten day trudge, talking mainly to Deaghall and Iain, ignoring the glares and occasional small stone missiles sent his way by Burr and the other boy he thought of only as Burr’s shadow.  The few younger boys didn’t harass him but followed him at a discreet distance with wide eyes that made him self conscious.    
  
All but four of the prisoners of war had been released before leaving the camp.  Aedion had watched them file out, and Deaghall had tactfully ignored the wetness on his cheeks as person after person had touched their brows in honor as they passed him.  The four who were retained had been kept in the prison wagon and fed and watered exclusively by Breiner’s most trusted guards.  He didn’t know who they were or what they’d done to result in being dragged along on this miserable journey, but he wished he could help them somehow.  Unfortunately he had no leverage.  Yet.  A situation he planned to change, however long it took.  
  
Hoofbeats sounded behind him just as he was starting up the hill, and he paused as Breiner trotted up, then reined back to a walk without looking at him.  They walked next to each other in silence for a while, the lord standing in his stirrups as his big chestnut dug in to climb.  Soon they had far outstripped the other soldiers, and Breiner said out of the corner of his mouth, “I want you to take care at this camp.”  
  
“Oh?” Aedion replied after a brief hesitation.  He waited, his huffing breaths matching the horse’s as they climbed, but the older man did not continue.  “Why?” he finally asked, stealing a glance up from the corner of his eye.  
  
Breiner’s lips were pressed, tension in every line of his face.  “I don’t know why they insisted you boys come to this camp.”  There was a long pause where Aedion almost gave up on getting more information, but then he continued.  “We’ve passed within a few miles of two other training facilities, including General Paget’s, both more suited for training younger soldiers than this one.  I would have expected to leave you at one of those, and I know Paget wanted you.  This general has…a reputation, though.”  Breiner glanced down, making sure Aedion was paying attention.  “He’s got a bit of a loose interpretation of ethics when handling prisoners.”   
  
Despite himself, the boy huffed a laugh.  “I wasn’t aware Adarlan had any ethical regulations when it came to their enemies.”  
  
“We do,” Breiner assured him.  “But Perrington seems to operate outside the law.”  Aedion’s heart sank like a stone.  He had heard that name.  Met him, in fact, almost a year ago, right before everything went to hell.  “He’s the younger cousin to Duke Perrington,” the lord went on, “the King’s Hand.”  Ah, so not the same man who had stared at Aedion and Aelin across the dinner table with fathomless black eyes, but a relative.  “And he’s part of the reason Adarlan’s forces have the reputation they do.  Be on your guard.”   They reached a more level spot and Breiner clucked to his horse, sending him into a brisk trot.  Aedion watched after him, mulling over the cryptic warning.  He ran his thumb over the subtle ridge of the scar his teeth had left in his palm all those weeks ago.  Aelin.  Rhoe.  Evalin.  Quinn.  Orlon.  Cal.  Marion.  Elide.  Ren.   A pass of his thumb for each name, over and over, with each step he took towards the gate that now loomed close.  
  
*****  
  
As Erik trotted Farus towards the gate, two of his personal guards flanked him on their chargers, Adarlanian colors flying on the standard held by Alfi.  The rest of the soldiers and camp workers were behind them in a loose formation, Aedion at the head with two of the younger boys behind him, the prison wagons and their guards in the center.  All these boys would be better off in Paget’s camp, he thought irritably as the remainder appeared over the crest of the hill.   
  
He halted Farus to one side of the gate as was protocol, Alfi and Iain continuing over the draw bridge and through the paired gates into the fort proper, setting themselves at the head of the lines his soldiers would form.  Erik watched his men approach, Aedion’s golden head bobbing along at the front.  Shit, he thought, he should have told Aedion the required procedure, and he couldn’t break his position now.  But the boy paused and made a bit of a show of pulling out his water skin and taking a drink, acting more winded than he no doubt was, allowing himself to be overtaken by the soldiers.  Clever boy.  When the three younger boys behind him, red-faced and sagging, followed suit with expressions of relief, Erik was struck again with just how canny the prince really was.  How well-schooled already in the leading of men.  
  
Deaghall approached the boys, leading Burr and Dain, and ushered them into the lines now forming as the men entered the gates.  The two older boys made to step on Aedion’s heels as they walked too close behind him, but a well-timed kick up from a booted heel caught Dain on the shin and they backed off a pace.  Erik fought to keep his face straight as Manas’ son furtively tried to rub his shin on the back of his other calf as he walked. Then they disappeared through the opening and he turned his attention to the prison wagon that was now approaching.  The half-dozen guards that surrounded it looked grave rather than relieved as they passed him.  They all knew what was likely to befall those men.  
  
Finally the last stragglers, wounded men who were well-enough recovered to make the journey, limped past and joined the lines, and he sent Farus through at a slow trot.  The horse’s fancy gaits were the reason he’d chosen him, despite the fact that his red coat was considered unsuitable for an officer, blacks and grays being more desirable.  But he heard the murmuring from the fort soldiers and residents as the huge stallion pranced between the lines, shining copper in the setting sun, while he sat tall in the saddle.  The prison wagon was rattling off towards the holding cells as he rode to where Perrington was waiting.  He swung off of Farus and handed his reins to Iain, who had fallen in behind him as he passed before facing the general.   
  
“Walk with me,” was all Perrington said as he turned on his heel and strode towards the largest of the houses.  Erik had never been to this particular fort, but all the permanent forts were set up in roughly the same alignment.  A gravel center square faced up to the general’s luxurious home.  A large dining hall stood opposite, and the barracks were in neat lines to one side.  The armory was adjacent to the large stone keep behind the main house, the stables beyond that.  Stone towers stood in each corner of the camp, with archers manning the upper floors.  Perrington’s living quarters were a bit more spacious than most, and more luxuriously appointed, Breiner noted wryly as he passed into a salon that could have satisfied the King himself.  Perrington seated himself in a large chair, and gestured Erik towards a low couch.    
  
“So,” Perrington drawled, “I understand you have brought me five Terrasen prisoners.”  
  
“Four, sir,” Erik corrected.  “I was ordered to release the rest.”  
  
The general cocked his head, fingers lightly resting on his lips as he studied Erik for a moment.  “Didn’t I understand that you were to bring me a prince of Terrasen?  Did I not in fact see him myself, lined up with the other youngsters?  Or did you hope to sneak him past me?”  
  
The heat rose in Erik’s face, and not for the first time he hated his betraying coloration, the flush that showed even through the deepest tan.  “I apologize, sir, I was not under the impression he was considered a prisoner.”  
  
Perrington’s knuckles were white on the arms of his chair as he leaned towards Erik.  “Have you gone mad, or is it simply that you have the heart of a nursemaid beating under your armor?  Are you running a sanctuary for wild beasts at that godsforsaken camp of yours?”  When Erik remained silent, the general rose slowly and stalked over towards a table that contained several bottles of amber liquid and a stack of glasses.  Erik had snapped to attention the second the general had stood, and so he remained as Perrington poured two glasses and handed one to him.  “Speak, man,” Perrington ordered, waving him on.  
  
“Sir, I’ve had two months now to observe the boy.  He’s a natural leader and a natural warrior.  He’s respectful.  The other boys follow his lead and the prisoners adore him.  We can use him, sir, to subdue the people of Terrasen with less loss of our own forces.”  Erik took a sip of his drink, more to be polite than because he wanted it.  If he was being honest with himself, all he really wanted was a good meal and to find one of the camp women willing to share her bed.   
  
The general sat back in his chair and surveyed him, amusement seeming to play on his features.  “A natural leader.  Everyone follows his lead.”  He shook his head slowly.  “Don’t you see, Erik, that this is precisely why he’s so dangerous?  You’re looking to shelter a snake and then you’ll be surprised when it bites you.”  He drained his drink in one gulp, and there was a long pause, broken by the small clink of the glass hitting the table.    
  
“Did you ever wonder why I was made general and you were not?”  Perrington laughed drily at the surprise no doubt written across his face.  “You bested me in every fight in training; you were a gifted speaker, and you’re an excellent strategist.  Don’t think all that went unrecognized.”  He shook his head pityingly.  “But you bought too much into Brullo’s teaching.  You subscribe to the idea that there’s some sort of moral code when it comes to our enemies.  And that’s an idea that some day is going to get you killed.  Probably by this creature whose throat you should have slit when you had the chance.”  
  
Erik mulled this over for a moment.  He had his own theories why, though he had surpassed Perrington through their years of training, the other man had advanced farther than he had, and it had more to do with their last names than with some sort of excessive moral squeamishness on his part.  True, Perrington had excelled in the “Enhanced Interrogation Techniques” while he had performed abysmally.  After all, he had always believed that torture was, in the end, unreliable.  Strong men would withstand it, and weaker ones would say whatever they thought you wanted to hear to get it to stop.  Brullo, his mentor and one of the main trainers of officers, had lectured that compassion towards those we conquered built loyal subjects, while suppression bred rebellion.    
  
Unfortunately, the latter seemed to  be the way Adarlan was leaning in recent years.  
  
He thought back to his relationship to Aedion, those first moments of calculated violence, his stubborn willingness to die… When it came down to it, he was certain that he had won the boy over more by vomiting after his threatened rape of that girl than by the threat itself.  He raised his eyes to meet Perrington’s cold black stare.  “With all due respect, sir, I maintain the belief that we can expanded our kingdom far more successfully by assimilation than by wanton destruction.  Talented young men who can be cultivated to our side can sway the minds of the people.”  
  
The condescending smirk that had settled on Perrington’s thin lips did not falter as he reached into his pocket and withdrew a letter, then slowly unfolded it.  Erik could see the seal of the King at the bottom.  “Well,” said the general sardonically, “I see that you have retained your habit of pretty speeches.  And it appears that you are an equally gifted letter-writer, given that you have persuaded His Majesty.”  He indicated the letter.  “But I am not blinded by weak compassion or visions of grandeur.  I will be watching that boy, and when he shows his true nature - as he will - I will be waiting.  And he will be praying for the noose before I’m done.  Now,” he tucked the letter back into his pocket and rose with a startling shift in his tone, “I’m sure it’s been a while since you’ve enjoyed the comforts of a solid roof over your head and sharing your bed with a woman.  Have a good evening.”  
  
*****  
  
Aedion strode out of the mess hall, needing fresh air, needing…a break.  When first he and the other boys had been shown into the trainee barracks, he had been relieved to be accepted by the few dozen Adarlanian boys with no more interest than the others, just a line of casual glances up as he tossed his pack down on the assigned bunk.  But Burr and Burr’s shadow had known a few of the other boys, and by the time they were sitting down to dinner there were murmurs all up and down the table, stares and glares and subtle posturing.  Thankfully the boys didn’t know his true title.  Clearly being a “recruit” from Terrasen made him an object of curiosity at best, more likely one of derision.  He couldn’t imagine what creative torture these other boys would come up with if they had known he was a prince and a member of the Terrasen and Wendlyn royal families.  Not that it mattered.  His thumb ran automatically over the scar on his palm, and he headed across the gravel square, looking for the stables.  Surely Breiner wouldn’t object if he checked in on Farus after their journey.  
  
The scent of horse and hay hit his nostrils and he followed it to a stone structure with a few small paddocks outside.  Ducking through the door, he blinked in the lamp light.  There were several wisened men and young boys setting out hay for the evening, but nobody paid him any notice as he walked down the aisle, looking into the rows of stalls.  Farus was in a large loose box down at the end, and he stuck his head over the door and whickered at Aedion.  Rubbing the glossy neck, he fed him an apple he’d snagged from the dinner table.  The two had made friends in the weeks at the war camp, Aedion having long been comfortable with horses from his frequent assignments to stable duty for various infractions.  Plus Farus didn’t give a shit where Aedion came from as long as he brought apples.  
When he had spent long enough with the stallion to earn suspicious looks from the stablehands, he found his way out the back door.  Creeping along the grass through the dark, he nearly tripped over a person who was crouched peering around the corner of the barn, just barely catching the scent of lavender and mint in time. He side-stepped at the last second, his boots crunching suddenly on the gravel path and earning a startled feminine yelp, then a hissed, “Shhhh” from the other.  
  
“I didn’t say anything,” he whispered.  
  
“Well don’t start now,” she spat under her breath, standing and spinning to face him.  He couldn’t see much of her in the dark, just that she had lighter hair that gleamed silver in the moonlight and that her head barely rose to his chest.  He ignored her and crept forward and peered around the corner of the barn himself, expecting something dramatic like an execution or a fight, though he heard nothing more than the usual sounds of movement and conversation.  Instead he found a collection of men and women mingling in the square.  Several of the men he recognized from his own camp.  
  
“What are you hiding from?” he asked, still keeping his voice low.  When there was no answer, he looked back at the girl to find her leaning away from him, face still hidden in the gloom.  She responded with an imperious wave, a silent order to keep his mouth shut.  He wasn’t sure why he obeyed but he turned his attention back to the milling forms out in the lit courtyard.  Some of the voices reached him, and he realized abruptly what was going on - a negotiation for the sharing of beds.  He felt the heat rise in his cheeks and was grateful for the dark, determinedly avoiding any glance at the girl.  Breiner seemed to settle on a voluptuous woman in a laundress’ outfit and they strolled out of view.  Deaghall soon disappeared as well, and in just a few moments the square was clear.    
  
A rustle behind him drew his attention back to the strange girl.  Without a word to him, she had turned to make her escape, but he slipped around her and cut her off.  She pulled up abruptly with a curse.  The moonlight hit her face now and that was real terror he could see in her eyes.  Taking a step back, he raised both his hands and murmured, “Easy, easy.”  
  
“I’m not a horse, you prick.  Now leave me alone.”  She pulled her cloak closer around her as she started to push past him.    
  
“Sorry.  I’m sorry.  I just wanted to ask if you were okay.”    
  
She stopped and looked up at him.  “What, do they breed saviors where you come from?  Just go back to your friends and get rested up so you can learn how to kill people tomorrow.”  With that, she shouldered him out of her way and disappeared into the gloom.  
  
*****  
  
Delaney scurried through the shadows, still keeping an ear open for the sound of male approach.  Thankfully this new group was small, only a few officers, and the grunts wouldn’t dare try for that privilege.  When she reached the row of huts reserved for the camp workers, she slipped through the back door of the fourth one and up the ladder into the loft.  Judging by the noises emanating through the single interior door, her mother was entertaining that tall brown-haired lord.  Her brother had moved to the barracks last spring, so she only had her sisters to be careful of as she shucked her shoes and crawled under the blankets that covered their pallet.  Another night safe.    
  
As she cuddled in against Avis, her mind went to the tall boy behind the stable.  His accent was odd, and his voice still had the inconsistency of transition despite his lanky height.  He must have come with the soldiers, though he certainly seemed surprisingly unaware of the rhythms of training camps.  At least for now.  Give him a few weeks and that careful consideration he’d given her would be trained right out of him.  Avis wrapped a thin arm around her and drew her in closer.  The sound of the child’s breathing was as good as a lullaby, and her last conscious thought was to wonder how the boy had moved so quickly to cut her off.  
  
*****  
  
The next few days quickly settled into a rhythm that was not dissimilar to that of the war camp.  Each of the boys was assigned to help in an area of the camp in the morning, and afternoons were reserved for training.  The main difference was the size, this place encompassing many hundreds of soldiers and trainees and the necessary staff to support them.  Aedion’s first week he was to work in the kitchens; evidently they rotated through there, the armory, the stables, and the gardens, one week at each place.    
  
He quickly won favor in the kitchens by tackling the giant stacks of dirty dishes without complaint.  The weeks at Breiner’s camp had taught him how to be both efficient and thorough, and with him washing and an unfamiliar Adarlanian boy drying they worked their way through the dishware with alacrity.  As they reached the end, the wizened old creature who ran the kitchens approached and eyed him carefully, calling out, “I don’t know about this new girl.  She seems too pretty to be a kitchen maid.  Or a soldier.” There were sniggers around the room and Aedion grinned down at her.  “I think we should make sure she gets sent to Rifthold.  No doubt she could entertain Prince Dorian quite well, even if she’s a few years older.”  
  
A twinge shot through Aedion’s heart as he remembered the black-haired prince and his “fine lady” manners, but he laughed as he held his hands out to the crone.  “I don’t know,” he replied, “I don’t think they’d let these anywhere near the prince.  He might be contaminated.”  She inspected his large hands, callused and flecked with scars, nails chipped, and patted him on the arm with a cackle.    
  
“Well, then, we must find a way to make you useful here.  Even if we can barely understand a word you say!”  A chorus of comments on his accent and his pretty face and the length of his hair followed as the other boy showed him where to stack the clean dishes.    
  
Training was similar to at Breiner’s camp, with somewhat stricter discipline.  Aedion quickly fought his way out of his age group and was put in with the most experienced boys.  Though he was superior to them as well in most regards, he was pleased to see they would learn some new weaponry that he had not yet handled.  He was also to learn to fight more on horseback, something he had up to now received minimal training in.    
  
Every night after dinner he visited the stables, giving attention to not just Farus, but all the horses.  They didn’t mind his accent, or his size, or his skill, but were content with apples and neck scratches.  The girl he had encountered remained a mystery, and another reason he visited the horses each night.  He had not seen her again.  Not that he was not at all certain he would have recognized her if he saw her, but he thought he’d recall that sweet lavender scent.   He still wondered sometimes what she had been hiding from.     
  
The shift came on the sixth day.  He had noticed the black-eyed man who had greeted Breiner on their arrival came to watch training every day, had felt that cold stare on him as he parried and blocked and aimed.  Perrington.  He looked little like his cousin, the man Aedion remembered from the days before the world went to hell, other than those eyes.   
  
This time, Perrington called training short and requested all attend the sentencing of the prisoners in the square.  Judging by the lack of surprise, this was a normal occasion, and the soldiers and trainees all bustled onto the large gravel expanse.  Aedion hovered near the back.  He didn’t need to see this, his countrymen sentenced to the mines or to death.  He watched anyway, feet braced apart as men were led onto a platform, their heads covered.  Five men, not the four they had brought with them.  He wondered who the fifth was.  As Perrington’s despicably nasal voice rose over the crowd, his thumb brushed the ridge on his palm.  One by one, the hoods were removed and the men stepped forward to hear their fate.  “For crimes against the crown, you will be sentenced to six months in Endovier…three years in Endovier…one year in Endovier…eighteen months in Endovier.”  These were all truly death sentences, nobody survived more than a few months in the salt mines; they just gave the illusion of hope for ultimate freedom.  Judging by the resigned expressions on each face, the men all knew this.  All for the crime of being soldiers of Terrasen, trying to protect their home from invasion.  
  
Finally the last man had his hood removed, and Aedion gasped loudly enough to earn curious glances from the boys around him.  It was Kenway, one of Cal Lochan’s favorite guards.  Aedion had assumed he had gone to the butcher’s block along with Cal.  His feet moved of their own accord, and he wove through the close-packed bodies until he was but a few rows from the front just as Perrington finished reading the charges against the man.  Kenway was looking out over the crowd, face impassive, giving no indication he was even listening to the summary of his crimes.  Just as Perrington intoned, “And for these crimes against the crown, you shall hang from the neck until you are dead,” Kenway’s eyes met Aedion’s and his eyes widened in shock before he schooled his face back into a neutral expression.  
  
Aedion closed his eyes, trembling, memories of riding out hunting with Kenway and Cal, Quinn and Rhoe, of sparring with sticks when he barely reached the older man’s waist, of jokes and meals shared all flickering behind his lids.  This was a good man, he thought.  Better than any of the Adarlanians, better than himself.  Kenway had helped Aelin onto her first pony, had given Elide a bouquet of tiny daisies when she had fallen and skinned her knee, had told no one when Aedion had cried after shooting his first deer.    
  
Without thinking, Aedion began moving, right to the very front of the crowd, his eyes fixed on his friend.  Kenway’s face was bruised, his lip split, and though he stood straight and proud it was obvious that he was guarding his ribs.  Perrington had put his paper down and turned his attention to Aedion where his golden head shone above the surrounding men, and it was with a thin smile that he added, “Unless someone shall volunteer to take his punishment.”  It took a few seconds for Aedion to realize what had been said, and he slowly turned to the general as boos echoed out around him.  He didn’t know if this was regular; in Terrasen, volunteers could take on certain punishments, such as whipping or time in the stocks, for nonviolent crimes.  He had never heard of this in the case of capital punishment.  Though he did recall hearing that Adarlan had allowed one member of a convicted family to volunteer to take the sentence for the rest.    
  
He could feel other eyes on him, and turned to see Breiner slowly shaking his head, Deaghall next to him looking grim.  On the other side of the square, standing in the shadow of one of the buildings, was a slip of a girl in a laundress outfit, reddish gold hair curling past her shoulders, biting her lip as she studied him.  Turning back to Kenway, he saw the older man looking at him with grief and love in his face, giving a barely perceptible shake of his head once he knew Aedion was looking.  Perrington was still staring at him, waiting, as the moment stretched into an eternity.    
  
Could he do it?  Could he offer his life for this man, who had done so much for his country?  He thought of the vow he had taken to help Terrasen, and how much better equipped Kenway was to fulfill it.  He could barter his life and be reunited with his family again.  Aelin.  Rhoe.  Evalin.  His mother…  
  
Just as he was about to take the step forward, open his mouth to call out, Kenway screamed, a vicious, primal sound, then spun and viciously head-butted the guard next to him, before throwing himself at another.  Despite his bound hands, he fought efficiently, taking down two more guards with his feet so quickly nobody even reacted.  The crack of one’s skull on the wood seemed to spur everyone into action, and soon he was swarmed, even Breiner, Iain, and Deaghall leaping onto the platform to subdue him.    
  
The boy watched in silence, unable to breathe, as Kenway was dragged nearly unconscious to the edge of the platform where the gallows stood, as his hood was pulled down and a noose settled over his neck, as smelling salts were applied until he was able to rise to his feet, as the floor dropped out of the platform and the crack of his neck echoed through the square even over the jeering, as his feet kicked out briefly and went still.  And still the boy stood as the crowd slowly quieted down, as the wagons rumbled over the cobbles for the other prisoners, as four men approached the brave Terrasen guard with knives to cut his body down. He remained rooted there as the sky darkened, as familiar faces approached, as gentle hands squeezed his shoulder and gentle words were spoken.  It was not until there was a sharp tug on his sleeve, then a pinch to his arm, and a feminine voice whispered, “You must leave now.  Come on, you must leave,” with a frantic urgency that the ground released his feet and he stumbled after the light hand on his arm, guiding him into the darkness.  
  
*****  
  
Erik watched as a young woman approached Aedion and plucked at his sleeve, finally convincing him to follow her.  He was leaving in the morning, taking his men back to their base camp far to the south and leaving the prince behind.  It was clear now why their departure had been delayed; Perrington had wanted to see his reaction to this spectacle.  He must have somehow known that the prisoner was familiar to the boy and hoped to provoke a response.  It had been a close thing, that much was clear.  It was hard not to respect the man for recognizing that and taking the necessary steps to keep the boy alive.  But now Erik must leave the boy to his fate, unable to even say farewell.  He wondered if he would ever see him again.  
  
He wondered if Aedion would have tried to save him, had he been about to hang.  And knew he would have made the same decision as that prisoner had in response.  
  
*****    
  
Delaney dragged the boy behind her, desperate to get him off the square before the general noticed his odd behavior.  She didn’t know who that prisoner was to this boy, but it was obvious to all who could see his face that he was ready to give himself over.  As if that would’ve saved the man.  She could have laughed at the boy’s naivety if it wasn’t so desperately…sad.  
  
Reaching the granary, she tugged the door open just far enough to slide through, the boy following mutely.  When it was nearly empty like his, it was an excellent spot to hide from prying eyes.  They headed up the stairs that hugged the wall, the grain dust settling on her hair, sticking to her skin.  She sat down on the small ledge that ran under the upper window and pulled him down next to her.  In the moonlight pouring through the window his face was ghostly, shadows pooling in the hollows under his sharp cheekbones and obscuring much of his mouth.  
  
The silence stretched on as the sounds outside slowly died.  Everyone would be at the evening meal, she thought.  She wondered if the boy would be missed.  Oh well.  As long as he was back in his bed by morning she doubted anyone would care.  “What’s your name?” she asked, her voice echoing in the nearly empty building.  He just looked at her uncomprehendingly.  Some instinct told her she needed to get him talking but he might as well have been deaf and mute for all he responded.  Perhaps she’d asked the wrong question, though it seemed simple enough; she tried again.  “Who was that man?”  
  
“Kenway Cranuc,” he said after another long pause, his voiced cracking.  “His name was Kenway Cranuc.”    
  
She knew that, as the general had named all the prisoners, but she nodded encouragingly.  “How did you know him?”  
  
The boy pulled his knees up to his chest and wrapped his arms around them.  “He was…he was a guard, for my uncle’s friend.  I thought he was taken when the rest of them were taken.  I thought he was gone, I thought…”  At that he broke down completely, pressing his face to his legs, lean body wracked with sobs.  Hesitantly, she scooted closer to him and wrapped her arms around him, holding tight.  This pose was familiar to her as for all his size, he reminded her somehow of her brother.  She pressed her cheek against his shoulder and waited until he began to quiet, and was still holding on when he whispered, almost too quiet to hear, “He was my friend.”  
  
They pulled apart then, both a little awkward, and she searched for something to say.  “You’re from Terrasen, then?”  He nodded, not looking at her.  The tracks down his face gleamed in the moonlight.  “Well, that explains the accent,” she added lightly.  No response.  “How’d you end up here?”  
  
“I was captured,” he said thickly, then cleared his throat.  “By Lord Breiner’s men, in the last battle before Terrasen surrendered.  Lord Breiner and General Paget decided to let me live.”  He snorted, but there was no amusement in the sound.  He cocked his head then, suddenly alert, evidently hearing something that escaped her ears.  “They’re finished with the meal,” he said, with a jerk of his chin to the window.  “You should go back to wherever you belong.”  
  
Delaney shook her head.  “Not yet.  After an execution it’s not safe for a bit.”  He flinched at the word, and she cringed internally.  “He still would have been executed,” she said, and he looked at her quizzically.  “If you had given yourself up.  They would have hanged you, and then hanged him anyway.”  She wanted to laugh at his dumbstruck expression but couldn’t bring herself to wound him any further.  “It’s how they call out traitors.  Not usually here, there aren’t too many of those at the fort, but it’s common in public hangings.”  
  
“You must think me a fool,” he said, shaking his head, then shrugging.  “Perhaps I am.”  
  
“No, but I think you come from a place where honor still has meaning.”  
  
“It doesn’t here?”  
  
Now she did laugh, a wry, bitter sound.  He accepted that answer with silence.  By this time she could hear the low murmur from the nearby square, and her mouth twisted in disgust.  
  
“Why do you hide?” the boy asked abruptly.  
  
“Because I’ve no desire to take a man to my bed.”  
  
He looked shocked at that answer.  “Surely you’re a bit young?”  
  
“I’m sixteen, and more than two years past my first cycle, so hardly.”  It was impossible to keep the bitterness from her tone.  
  
“But if you didn’t want to, would they truly force you?”  The sympathy in his voice made her skin crawl.  She didn’t want the pity of this strange, awkward boy; didn’t know what to do with it.    
  
“What are you, a child?” she snapped.  “I’m a laundress, and that’s as good as a whore.  Sure they’d toss a piece of silver on my table and call us square.”  He growled then, a startlingly fierce sound from his skinny frame, all the more eerie for the echoes through the mostly empty building.  “Shush, shush, you’ll give us away,” she hissed, unnerved.  It struck her that she was very alone with a strange boy twice her size, and she felt her mouth grow dry.  
  
“You’ve nothing to fear from me,” he said, holding his hands up as he had the other night, and she wondered how he knew what she was feeling.  He stood up then, stooping to keep from hitting his head on the strut above them.  “Are you safe to get home?”  
  
She nodded mutely, and he dusted the loose grain from his clothes and slipped silently down the curved stairs.  At the bottom he stopped and gave her a little wave.  “I’m Aedion,” he said, answering her first question at last.  
  
“Delaney.”  
  
And with that, he cracked open the door and disappeared.


	4. Chapter 4

He stood in the watch tower, crossbow in hand, looking north.  The air still had the bite of winter, but the snow drops were beginning to show their white heads and spring was nearly here.  It had been two years to the day since he had lost everything and the world had gone to hell, and  eighteen months since he’d been taken by the enemy.  Eighteen months in which he’d gained a few inches and thirty pounds of muscle, while his voice had finished deepening to a rich, rolling baritone, his accent no less pronounced but no longer mocked.  In which he’d learned how to use the crossbow, and the mace, and to fight as easily from horseback as from the ground.  Eighteen months for him to make friends among the soldiers, the kitchen staff, the laundresses, the gardeners, the stable hands.  For him to learn how they patrolled, how they strategized, to become the voice they all listened for.  For him to have been earmarked for advancement as an officer, for even Perrington to stop tracking his every move.  
  
Eighteen months for them to forget that they had a wolf in their midst.    
  
*****  
  
Delaney was waiting for him as he came out of the tower at the end of his watch.  He strode over to her with a nod, and she fell in as he passed.  They walked in silence towards the mess hall, her eyes drifting to him periodically.  He’d grown since she’d met him, put on about thirty pounds of muscle, and even though his broadening frame needed at least thirty pounds more he was still the largest person at the camp.  He’d never intimidated her, not since that night he’d cried out his heart-pain in the granary, but today she couldn’t quite ignore the clenched jaw, the tension in his shoulders that made him loom over her even more than usual.  
  
“What’s with you?” She finally interrupted his reverie.    
  
“Nothing,” he snapped back.  She merely raised an eyebrow in return, and he sighed, rubbing his hands over his face, roughing up the patchy stubble that was beginning to grow along his jaw.  “Sorry.  Today’s just…hard.”  
  
She didn’t ask why; if he wanted to tell her, he would.  He only seemed to get moody if something reminded him of his prior life.  It was the worst kept secret in camp that he was no mere captured warrior-in-training but a prince of Terrasen.  Her brother Raedan had told her first, in gleeful whispers over dinner one night.  Raedan had also been the one who had gushed breathlessly over the speed and grace with which Aedion fought, who preened every time the prince praised him or gave him advice.  The boys were nearly the same age but were about as similar as a barn cat and a mountain lion.   
  
It had been many months since Delaney had been able to stop skulking around the fort, thanks to this hulking giant by her side.  Even she couldn’t really have told how the friendship had happened exactly, given that laundresses and trainees didn’t spend time together. Initially they just kept bumping into each other, she trying to hide from the men in the camp, he being too restless to settle in the barracks with the other boys after the evening meal.  He always headed for the stables and would spend long periods grooming the horses.  Like everyone else, the stable boys at first thought he was odd, but he laughed and joked and worked his way into their acceptance.  When her own wanderings took her by there as he was leaving, they would nod hello and exchange a few words, awkward at first but soon warming into conversation.  She found her feet carrying her there more and more often, and eventually she ended up spending the evenings among the warm-smelling beasts, passing Aedion a curry comb or dandy brush as he worked.   There was something soothing about the stables: the rhythmic noise of chewing, the quiet rustling in straw, the large curious eyes that surveyed her from under forelocks.    
  
Once again it was Raedan who made her aware of the gossip that swarmed the camp.  This time the rumor was that Aedion had taken her as his lover.  She had laughed in her brother’s awestruck face when he asked her if it were true.  It hadn’t taken her long, though, to realize how much that particular falsehood benefitted her.  Nobody would dare approach a girl with that fierce warrior-prince as a lover regardless of his age.  Pretty soon she began seeking him out in daylight hours, frequently joining him at meals or bringing him clean towels after training, and he accepted the change of routine warmly and without question.  She had never asked him if he knew the rumors, but his protective posturing when she was near the older men in camp indicated he did.    
  
She had also never dared ask him if he did in fact care for her.  Not when she could never care for him in that way, when her love could never be more than that of an adopted-sister.  
  
*****  
  
They were almost at the mess hall when something penetrated Aedion’s foul mood.  Someone was staring at Delaney.  He stiffened and looked around in the growing dark, to find three men standing on the general’s front step, looking in their direction.  Looking at him, not her.  He inhaled deeply.  Their scents were unfamiliar, and one of them had that same odd metallic smell that he sometimes noticed on Perrington.  He looked away, pretending he hadn’t seen them, and shouldered Delaney through the door.  She glanced up at him, her face tight, for once not peppering him with her usual teasing insults.  Gods.  He was being such a prick today.      
  
After grabbing food at random from the long buffet, oblivious to what he selected, he followed her to where she sat with her sisters.  Avis smiled at them sweetly, while Maida studied his plate.  “Do you really like gravy on your peas?” she asked, though with her lisp it sounded more like “peathe.”    
  
He looked down at his plate. In his fog, he had in fact put gravy all over his peas and asparagus, missing his potatoes and pork entirely.  Shrugging, he shoveled a forkful into his mouth and chewed vigorously, crossing his eyes at her.  She giggled and primly selected a tiny piece of potato that Avis had cut for her.  With his next bite, he made an even more grotesque face, and soon both girls were laughing while Delaney smiled indulgently at her sisters.  They were interrupted by Raedan dropping his plate loudly on the table, accompanied by a small splash of gravy.  Aedion suppressed a grin.  No matter where he sat - with Delaney and her sisters, with the trainees, with the stable hands - Raedan appeared.  The only table he wouldn’t approach was that of the older soldiers who had accepted Aedion’s pushing his way in grudgingly, but were unlikely to welcome another.  
  
“Did you hear?” Raedan asked, nearly vibrating with excitement.  “The selectors for officer training just came!”  Ah.  So that was who those men were.  “I heard you were on their list.  And so was Cobden, and Ayner, and Hardwin, and Torr.  And some of the older men.”  He somehow managed to fit a giant mound of pork and potatoes into his mouth, and then continued, muffled, “I can’t believe they’re going to take you to be an officer, you’re only sixteen.”  
  
Delaney glared at her brother in warning.  “We don’t know they’re going to pick him,” she snapped.  “They only usually take a couple, and they’ve never taken anyone below eighteen before.”    
  
Struggling manfully to swallow, Raedan choked for a second before replying, “You just don’t want your lover going to Rifthold.”  
  
There was a beat of silence while Avis and Maida looked back and forth between Aedion and Delaney, eyes round, mouths open.  Aedion could feel the heat rising in his face.  He had heard the rumors but didn’t think anyone really believed them, least of all Delaney’s own family.  It occurred to him that he had no idea what she had told her family about him, or even what her own feelings were about him.  She treated him much as she treated Raedan, though she obviously relied on him more for protection.  Despite the fact that his cock seemed to have a mind of its own these days, he had never thought of her as anything other than a sister-friend.  The possibility that she felt more…  
  
“Don’t be ridiculous.” She interrupted his reverie with a reach across the table to smack her brother in the head.  “We talked about this ages ago.”  
  
“I know,” he said, shrugging, ignoring his mussed-up hair.  “I didn’t believe you.”  
  
She laughed then, and the younger girls relaxed.  “Obviously.  No, it’s just,” she turned to Aedion, tone earnest, “they never have taken anyone under eighteen.  I didn’t want you to feel…”  
  
He grinned back, that cocky, irritating smile that always riled her up.  “You didn’t want me to feel inadequate if they chose someone else?”  Now it was her turn to blush.  “Nah, it would’ve been their loss.”  
  
“I should’ve known nothing could make you feel inadequate, you arrogant bastard.”  He quirked an eyebrow at her, and her flush deepened.  Shit.  He probably should talk about this with her.  Sometime when they weren’t surrounded by her family.  Oh gods, if she really did want him like that, what would he do?  He’d never been with anyone yet, relying on his hand to take the edge off, and to think about that with Delaney…His skin crawled.  It’s not that she wasn’t pretty, she was probably the prettiest girl…woman…at the fort; it just felt wrong somehow.  Maybe because she was the only real friend he had left.  Or because with her snarly bossiness masking her fears, Delaney kind of reminded him of Aelin.  He glanced sideways at her, at the bloom her blush had left on her face, at the wariness that remained in her hazel eyes despite her joking manner.  Shit.  
  
*****  
  
Shit.  Trust Raedan to blurt that out in front of the girls and Aedion.  Poor Aedion, he looked like his foot was caught in a trap though he was obviously trying to ignore it.  The rest of the meal passed in a blur of talk about training and joking with the girls.  Maida had forgotten all about it once she dug into the stewed cinnamon apples Aedion brought her, but Avis kept glancing between them, hope shining in her round face.  
  
After the meal they split up, Delaney walking the girls back to the hut, Aedion heading to the stables, Raedan to the barracks.  “So are you?” Avis asked the second they were out of earshot.     
  
“Am I what?” Delaney hedged.  
  
“His lover.”  
  
She sighed.  “No, honey.  I’m not.”  
  
“But why not?” Maida chimed in.  “He’s nice.  And he’s strong.  And he’s handsome.”  
  
Delaney couldn’t help but laugh at that.  “Yes, he’s all of those.”  
  
“So why don’t you like him?”  
  
“I do like him,” she replied, “I just don’t love him.  I can’t.”  Two young brows furrowed in confusion and she sighed again.  “I don’t know how to explain it.”  
  
The girls were silent for the rest of the walk back to the empty hut.  Their mother was nowhere to be found, and Delaney didn’t want to know where she was.  As she supervised the washing of faces and cleaning of teeth, she could see Avis turning it all over in her head.  Finally, after tucking them in, Avis whispered, “I wish you could.”  
  
Delaney smiled a little sadly as she kissed Avis’ temple.  “Me too, honey.  Me too.”  
  
*****  
  
Aedion walked to the stables in a bit of a daze, his mind a swirl of emotions.  He grabbed some brushes and settled in to groom Sparrow, the giant gray mare with the ironic name he had been assigned for training.  She pinned her ears as he entered her stall, but when she realized he was going to let her eat she ignored him.  The rhythm of currying the loose hair off of her was soothing, and his head began to clear for the first time all day.  
  
Officer training.  He was on the list for officer training.  If only he could actually be made an officer, perhaps be given a force of his own…  There would be no better way to seed discord than within the King’s vast army itself.  But it would have to be done carefully.  He would have to fight and kill for the King before he could hope to advance, would have to come up with a way of hiding his true intentions while not turning any rebels he found against him.  Was it even possible, he wondered, to win the trust of the people who mattered while keeping up appearances by slaughtering for the enemy?  
  
He was still mulling that over when Delaney entered the stable.  A twinge of guilt shot through him.  She headed over and leaned against the stall door watching him in silence.  He nodded a greeting and bent over to inspect Sparrow’s shoes and clean her feet.  “I told them,” she said after looking around that nobody was near.  He set the foot down and straightened to meet her eye over the horse’s broad back.  “I told them there was nothing like that between us.”  Her eyes were clear and free of any strong emotion.  
  
“How did they take it?” he asked, unsure how to respond.  
  
Her lips quirked up in a crooked half-smile.  “Avis is disappointed.  She thinks you’re handsome.”  
  
“Well, obviously,” he said, gesturing to himself.  She grinned, and he went on.  “Are you…okay with this?”  
  
“Yeah.  You’re really not my type.”    
  
Relief warred with indignation at her response, and he had to laugh internally at his own inconsistency.  “Oh?  Why not?”   
  
Delaney took a deep breath, as if she was about to dive into dark unknown water.  “Well, you’re almost pretty enough, but I’m pretty sure you have a cock and that disqualifies you.”  
  
Oh.  OH.  Well, that he understood, though he was not exactly particular about such things.  She was looking at him worriedly, waiting for his reaction.  “I can prove that fact if you want to erase all doubt,” he said without thinking, and was rewarded for his carelessness by a gut-busting belt of laughter.  
  
“No need, unless you’ve been stuffing socks down your pants at all hours of the day,” she replied tartly.  He flushed at that and picked up a dandy brush and set to work on Sparrow’s mane.  “Are you disappointed?” she asked more gently.    
  
Turning to her, he shook his head.  “No, you’re not really my type either.”  
  
“What’s you’re type, then?”  
  
He shrugged, not thinking “anyone but you” was an acceptable answer.  “Um, I don’t really know. Just not people who remind me of my cousin.”    
  
It was Delaney’s turn to be startled.  “I remind you of your cousin?”  He nodded, turning back to the horse to hide the pricking in his eyes that started whenever he thought of Aelin.  When he  turned back she was looking at him speculatively.  “Have you ever?”  
  
He knew what she meant.  “No.  You?”  
  
She shook her head and he resumed his brushing.  “You could, you know.  Pretty much anyone here would be happy to help you past that particular milestone.”  His brain rebelled against that, though his cock thought it was a fantastic idea.  Traitor.  Damn thing had a worse hair trigger than his crossbow.  He kept his hips facing the horse while trying to think about dysentery, the bloated carcass of a deer he had once found in the woods, that time he had thrown a rotten egg at Ren and Ren had tackled him and rubbed it in his hair in retaliation.  None of it worked until Delaney added with a cynical snort, “Actually if you have some silver on you my mother would probably take care of it any time.”        
  
Aedion shuddered at the thought.  She was the same age as Evalin had been, and plus the whole concept of fucking Delaney’s mother felt like incest.  He patted Sparrow, who just shoved her face deeper into her hay, and put away the brushes.  They headed out into the dark camp; it was a cloudy night and the only light came from the barracks and the huts.  As soon as they were away from the stables, Delaney asked casually, “So, do I look like her?”  
  
It took Aedion a moment to think of who she meant.  “My cousin?”  He laughed a little.  “Gods no.”  
  
“But you said -”  
  
“Yeah, I didn’t mean in looks.  Aelin looked like me, just tinier.  Gods, she was so small…”  Suddenly he wanted to talk about her.  It was like now, two years after her death she was demanding he remember every detail.  He held his huge hands out in front of him, staring at the palms as they walked.  “I came over when I was five, and she had just been born.  I remember when they let me hold her for the first time.  She was so fragile, I couldn’t believe they’d trust me not to break her.  And she just gave this huge yawn, and blinked at me, and I…”  His voice broke a little then, but he wasn’t ashamed.  “I was in love.”  
  
“I know what you mean.”  Delaney’s voice was thick.  “I don’t really remember when Raedan was a baby, I was too young, but with Avis, there was just so much trust.  Nobody trusted me.  I don’t blame them, I was a wild little fool who climbed all the trees and stole the jam and once let the horses out into the garden, but Avis didn’t know about any of that.  She just believed I’d keep her safe.  So I did,” she finished simply.  
  
Aedion shifted course towards the small herb garden that backed the kitchens and sat down on the low retaining wall, Delaney settling next to him.  “She was wild too.  I spent half my life chasing after her trying to keep her from destroying stuff, and the other half knocking around kids who made fun of her.” He laughed a little.  “Well, of us.  Everyone said I was too attached to her.”  He was quiet for a long moment, until Delaney shifted so she was pressing her arm against his.     
  
“How did she die?” she asked, and though her voice was little more than a whisper it felt like a scream.  
  
“You don’t know the story?”  She shook her head.  “I would have thought everyone knew how Adarlan came to take over Terrasen.”  
  
She shrugged, the tension in her body belying the casual gesture.“All I was ever told was that the king of Terrasen and his heir were assassinated, and that Adarlan was going to try to stabilize the continent by taking over.  Then the lords organized an army against us so we had to fight.  But what does your cousin have to do with it?”  When he didn’t respond, she prompted, “I mean, I know you’re a prince of Terrasen, so I’m guessing she was a princess?”  
  
“Gods,” he said under his breath.  He squeezed his eyes shut, hoping it would somehow make it easier to talk about it.  “I’m not actually a prince of Terrasen,” he said.  “I’m a prince of Wendlyn, that’s where I was born.  My mother was Evalin Ashryver’s cousin.  Evalin married Rhoe Galathynius, who was heir to the crown of Terrasen, and Aelin was their daughter.”  He tapped a finger against the retaining wall, trying to figure out how much to tell this daughter of Adarlan.  “Two years ago today, the King of Adarlan and Prince Dorian came to visit.  Now, Aelin had fire magic, and she didn’t always have great control.”  Opening his eyes, he glanced over at Delaney, who was staring off into the dark, listening tightly.  “She had an…episode, and they thought that taking her to their country house would be safest.  Everyone was kind of afraid of her, her gift was so strong.”  He paused again, almost seeing that bright flame flickering before him.  
  
“But you weren’t.”  It wasn’t a question.  
  
“No.  I wasn’t.  But they didn’t let me go with them, just Rhoe and Evalin and Aelin went, with Evalin’s lady-in-waiting and a few other household staff.   That night, King Orlon was assassinated in his bed in Orynth, and at the same time, miles away, so were Rhoe and Evalin.”  
  
“And Aelin?”  
  
“She was the one who found them,” and at the thought of his fierce Fireheart finding her dead parents his voice broke.  “She found them in their bed with their throats cut.  One of the servants rode to Orynth in a panic, and they left Lady Marion and Aelin behind.  I don’t know if they thought they were safer there because they hadn’t been touched, or what.  Meanwhile, the King of Adarlan ordered me to be locked up in the tower.  For my safety, supposedly.”  He snorted, but there was no humor in the sound.  “The whole castle was in confusion, and nobody thought to ride out for Aelin.  By the time they did, they found Marion beheaded in the kitchen and Aelin was gone.”  
  
Delaney was staring at him now, hand over her mouth and tears coursing down her cheeks.  “Where did she go?” she whispered, as if she were afraid to know the answer.    
  
“They followed her tracks down to the river.  There were hoof prints, too, so we think she was pursued.  Or herded, more like.  The bridge had been cut, and the tracks ran right to where it should have been, then disappeared.  It was freezing water, and the river runs fast, and she was never a strong swimmer…”  He put his head in his hands, unable to see anything but her tiny body and golden head being swept under the current.  Delaney slipped her arm through his, and wrapped that arm around her and pulled her in close enough to rest his cheek on her hair.  She stiffened, then relaxed into the hold.  
  
“What happened to you?” she asked after a while.  
  
“I stayed locked in the tower for over a month, until after magic disappeared.  Then some of Rhoe’s men broke me out and I joined the lords.  After I was captured in that last battle, Terrasen surrendered and here I am.”  The first frogs of spring were beginning to call in the small pond beyond the fort wall.  Delaney shifted a little and Aedion released her, then stood and held out his hand to help her up.  She took it and once she was on her feet she studied him for a moment.  
  
“And why are you still here?”  
  
He had been asking himself that question all day, but he knew he couldn’t tell Delaney the answer he had come to, so he settled for a different truth.  “Because they haven’t killed me yet.  Because I have nowhere else to go.”  
  
*****  
  
Delaney didn’t want to admit how much Aedion’s story had shaken her.  As she lay in her loft bed with her sisters, she thought of the lies she had been fed - that the Terrasen royal family had been assassinated by a foreign force; that Adarlan was just trying to keep the continent intact by taking over the country.  It was clear from his dry tone when he mentioned the King of Adarlan that he didn’t believe his presence there was a coincidence, though it would be treason to suggest otherwise.  
  
Most of all, she pictured Avis or Maida finding their mother dead, then running for their lives only to drown in an icy river.  She thought of Raedan being locked in a tower while he learned of the death of one of his sisters.  Would he have raged as no doubt Aedion had done?  Would he have even lived and remained sane through all that loss?  And in the end, would he betray his country for the sake of his own survival?    
  
Long into the night, she watched the girls’ steady breathing, sometimes touching their hair to reassure herself of their existence, thinking of Aedion clinging to her so tightly while he told his story, as if she were the one he was keeping from the water.    
  



	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is by far the most violent chapter of this story. It involves deliberate injuring and rape. While the ramifications of this will be addressed in an ongoing fashion, the rest of the story will not be as intense. If you wish to continue the story but are concerned re: being triggered, skip this chapter and move on to the next.

“So, you’re here to take care of my royal guest, I understand,” General Perrington said, sipping from his glass.  A letter with the royal seal sat on the table next to the decanter.  
  
Colonel Malins smiled, tapping his fingers against his knee.  “Yes, sir.  The King sent me to determine the best course for our young friend.”  
  
“Ah.”  He leaned back, studying the officer.  He had known him superficially for years, and admired his talent for breaking in more opinionated men.  His eyes fell on the ring Malins wore, a twin to his own.  “I see the King has gifted you as he has myself.”  
  
“Yes,” the colonel said, admiring the black stone adorning his right hand.  “I am privileged to be admitted into that circle.  Now,” returning his focus to Perrington, “what can you tell me about the boy.  I understand he has particular talents?”  
  
The general’s lips tightened.  “He’s an interesting study, that is certain.  I’ve never seen anyone fight like he does, there is a ferocity to him that is not quite…human.”  Malins arched a brow at that.  “And he has a rare gift for inspiring devotion.  He hadn’t been here a month before he had all the servants eating out of his hand, the trainees too.  Even some of my seasoned men.  He’s a quick study and a hard worker.  In short, to the casual eye he’d be the perfect officer.”  
  
“But not to yours.”  
  
“Not to mine, it’s true,” Perrington agreed.  
  
“And yet, you have not seen fit to discipline him.  You have allowed him a foothold here, much as Breiner did before you.”    
  
Perrington bristled at the censure in the words, though the tone was bland.  “I have followed my orders from the King.  The boy has proven more circumspect than anticipated, and has committed no outward treason.”  
  
Malins nodded, considering.  “Interesting.  Yes, the King wants him alive, for now at least.  My orders are to break him so he will be a suitable officer to aid in subduing the rebellion in the north.”  
  
“Oh?  Does our King believe he will need such assistance?”  
   
“Unfortunately.  Our men are having little luck, not knowing the terrain nor the people.”  
  
The general raised his glass in a salute.  “Then let me know how I may assist you.  Breaking the boy would be a pleasure.”  
  
Malins rose then and bowed to Perrington.  At the door he paused.  “Does the boy have any particular friends here?  A lover perhaps?”  
  
“Why, as a matter of fact, he does.”  Perrington’s lips curled into a small smile.  “Perhaps the laundress will finally make herself useful.”  
  
*****  
  
Aedion picked up his parrying dagger and unsheathed his sword.  Facing up against Balam was always a chore; though a seasoned warrior, he fought angry and therefore carelessly, and was beyond unpleasant when he was beaten.  On the other hand, he was nearly as tall as Aedion and had perhaps fifty pounds on him, not all of it fat.  The fact that he was also above average at fighting with two weapons meant he always provided a good workout.  There was a larger crowd than usual today, and a number of the older veterans were smiling a bit too much.  Something was up, but he didn’t know what.  
  
The three officers who had arrived the day before were standing a bit apart, watching impassively.  Dale was calling time today, and whistled sharply to signal the start.  As usual, Balam rushed in too quickly, then paused to set his feet.  Aedion stepped in with a hard strike, then spun out of reach.  Balam chased him, over-pursuing, and Aedion was able to trap his sword and nearly disarm him.  Using his superior weight Balam shoved hard, sending Aedion back, but he kept his balance and was able to dance away and parry the next strike easily.  In a few more movements, Balam was disarmed, and Aedion bowed to him as was customary.  As he straightened up he felt another approach and spun to catch Snell’s strike.  Evidently the smaller man had been sent in to test him, and Aedion realized a bit late that the whistle had not sounded.  He trapped Snell’s weapon between his dagger and his sword and shoved hard, sending the little man backwards ass-over-tip.  Whipping around, he countered the next move from Balam, who had recovered his sword and attacked fresh.  Disarming him again took but a moment, and this time Aedion kicked the sword out of the ring as Torr came at him.  Only eighteen and untested in battle, Torr was still a smart fighter, and had better footwork than most of the older men.  He was also not as strong, he, like Aedion, not yet having filled out into his full warrior’s body.  Aedion flipped his hands, taking his dagger in his right and his sword in his left, then went on the offensive.  Torr parried well, his counter-offense coming closer to throwing Aedion off-balance than either of the other men had done.  Grinning like a wolf, he attacked again, working the other boy’s feet until he began to tire.  Finally, he dropped the point of his sword into the ground at Torr’s feet and stepped in, trapping his opponent’s sword against his body.  A strike to the wrist with the hilt of the dagger forced the boy to release his sword.  The whistle sounded then, and Aedion and Torr bowed to each other.  Just as he straightened, he heard a high-pitched whine and whipped around, blade up, to deflect the dagger that had been flung in his direction.  
  
It was Balam’s dagger, and had he not reacted either he or Torr would have been badly injured.   Aedion charged him, throwing his own weapons down to meet him hand to hand, jamming his finger into the older man’s chest.  “You fucker!,” he snarled, loudly enough for everyone to hear.  “The match was over, you cocksucking son of a bitch.  What in Hellas’ realm are you playing at!”  Balam growled an incoherent response and grabbed the hand Aedion jabbed at him with his own meaty fist, quickly twisting the fingers until Aedion heard them crack.  Suddenly the ground was soft beneath his feet and he almost went down.  Recovering, he jabbed the heel of his free hand into the older man’s chin, snapping his head back.  “What the fuck is wrong with you?” he screamed in Balam’s face.  He was dimly aware of the men rushing at them, the hands grabbing at his shoulders, and the three officers standing apart watching impassively.  He didn’t even know what he was shouting, just every epithet he had ever heard was pouring out of his mouth, until Balam bared his teeth at him and gave his fingers another twist.  This time Aedion did go down on one knee and Balam released his hand.  Surging up, he tried to get to the older man but someone had him around the neck; with the ground abruptly turned to quicksand, the person managed to drag him away.  With grim satisfaction he saw Dale in Balam’s face, bitching him out, and he finally shook off his restrainer and straightened up.     
  
It was Hardwin who had corralled him, and they eyed each other warily for a moment before the other boy’s eyes dropped to his left hand.  He followed the look and then had to swallow back bile; three of the fingers were dangling in a way that indicated a marked loss of structural integrity, and the fourth was not much better.  As soon as that registered, the pain hit, a throbbing that he could feel all the way up to his shoulder.    
  
“Damn, man,” Hardwin said admiringly.  “You don’t know when to quit, do you?”    
  
“Now seems like a good time,” Aedion replied drunkenly, and he sank to the grass, cradling the useless hand.  The fingers were already turning purple.  Shit. The other boys in camp were crowding around him, oohing at the grotesque mess that had just moments ago been a fully functional hand.  He wished they’d all leave so he could vomit quietly in private.    
  
An unfamiliar voice said over his shoulder, “That was quite a show back there.”    
  
Aedion craned his head to see one of the officers standing behind him, hands behind his back; thankfully it was the slighter brown-haired one, not the big dark one with the metallic stench.  “The fighting or the cursing?” he asked stupidly.    
  
The man laughed.  “Both, actually, but I meant the fighting.  Now, we best get you to the healer so you can get those fingers set.  I’ll see you later.”  The officer beckoned at the other boys and Raedan and Hardwin rushed to help him to his feet.    
  
“Delaney’s gonna strangle you when she hears about this,” Raedan said as they headed towards the infirmary.  
  
“No doubt.”  
  
*****  
  
Aedion was particularly grateful it was his left hand that was damaged when he picked up his fork.  He’d spent years learning to fight ambidextrously but had never tried to eat that way, and with his fingers splinted and wrapped tightly to each other he couldn’t even close that hand.  True to form, Delaney kept glaring at him, and he knew she was waiting until they were alone to blister his ears for his stupidity going after Balam.  He still thought it was an appropriate reaction to having a knife throne at one’s head, but that didn’t change that he had violated the camp hierarchy.  Despite the misstep, his meal kept being interrupted by soldiers stopping by to ask how he was doing.  He had never even spoken to many of these men but it seemed screaming obscenities at one profoundly disliked senior grunt was an effective way to boost his popularity.  
  
He had just gotten started grooming Sparrow, waiting for Delaney to appear and flay him, when one of the younger boys appeared.  “Colonel Malins would like to see you.  I’m to take you there right away.”  Colonel Malins.  The name was unfamiliar; he must be one of the visiting officers.  Dropping the brushes in the box, he followed the boy out of the stables and down one of the rarely used paths that led to the outbuildings.   Many of these buildings were used for storage, but a few of them had fireplaces and were offered to visitors from other camps as guest houses and temporary offices.  It was to one of the latter he was brought, light shining from the windows that faced the buildings on either side.  The door opened before he could knock, and he found himself face to face with the strange-smelling man.  
  
He gave the small bow that was protocol, murmuring, “Colonel.”  Malins gestured for him to enter, then closed the door behind him before taking a seat at the desk.  Not having been told to sit, Aedion remained standing at attention.    
  
“So.  What is your name, son?”  
  
“Aedion Ashryver, sir.”  
  
“Ashryver, Ashryver.”  The man leaned back in the chair, steepling his fingers while he studied Aedion.  “Are you kin to the rulers in Wendlyn?”  
  
“Yes, sir.”  
  
“I’m surprised they allowed you to be taken into custody over here.”  Aedion didn’t reply, and Malins let the silence settle.  “In what way are you related to them?”  
  
“My mother was an Ashryver, sir.”  
  
“And who sired you?”  
  
“I don’t know, sir.”  
  
The colonel stood up then and came around to lean against the desk .  “Really.”  
  
“That is correct, sir.  She had no acknowledged consort.”  He held the colonel’s black gaze for what felt like minutes.  His hand was throbbing and he sincerely wanted to just head to his bunk and pretend like the day had never happened.  
  
Abruptly, Malins changed tactics.  “Forgive me,” he said in a courtly tone, “I have not explained why I called you in.”  The abrupt shift set Aedion’s teeth on edge but he kept his face neutral. “You are, as I’m sure you know, on our list for assessment for suitability for advancement.  Today was a fine demonstration of your fighting skill; indeed, you are one of the more talented candidates I have ever seen.  You also have the rare benefit at your age of being battle tested.  Tell me, why did you shift your weapons when you faced your final opponent?”  
  
“Because Torr is less experienced than the others, sir.  He is also naturally left-handed and I am not.”    
  
Malins nodded.  “So you wanted a fairer fight.”  
  
“It was a training exercise.  It made sense to keep things more equal.”  
  
Straightening up, Malins walked over to a pitcher and poured a glass of water.  “Would you like some?”  
  
“No, thank you, sir,” he replied, feeling more and more at sea.  
  
Sitting the glass on the desk untouched, Malins leaned back against it and crossed his arms, studying Aedion for a while.  “You’re a bit of a conundrum, son.”    
  
“Sir?”  
  
“You correctly assessed the purpose of the exercise and adjusted your tactics according to your opponent, ensuring that the less experienced man got worked appropriately.  That is ideal officer thinking.  You then assaulted a higher-ranking member of the army.”  Aedion gritted his teeth but said nothing.  “Granted, it was provoked, but nevertheless…”  A long pause ensued, Malins seeming to wait for Aedion to say something.  When nothing was forthcoming, he cocked his head to the side and asked, “How did you react so quickly when he threw that dagger?”  
  
“I heard it, sir.”  
  
“You heard it.”  Flatly.  
  
“Yes, sir.”  Another stretch of silence.  
  
“And why did you then attack the soldier responsible?”  
  
Aedion smiled without humor.  “While a knife thrown at an unprotected back may well be an excellent tactic when facing the enemy, I don’t believe it should be employed against one’s allies.  The fact that it put not just me but also Torr at risk made the complaint more significant.  Sir.”  
  
The colonel tapped a finger against his thigh.  “You do understand why that behavior is concerning, though, in a prospective officer.”  
  
“Yes, sir.”  Malins made a “go on” gesture.  “The hierarchy within the army must be respected and upheld by the officers.”  
  
“Exactly.  What should you have done?”  
  
“Allowed Lieutenant Dale to address discipline, sir.  After I deflected the dagger.”  
  
“Yes,” Malins nodded sagely.  “That would have been the wiser course.  Now, before we can accept you for officer training, we need to be more…certain that your temper will not get the better of you.  I’d like to have a couple of my colleagues come in so we can discuss this further.”  
  
He nodded, and Malins beckoned at the window.  Two sets of footsteps sounded on the step.  Aedion remained at attention, waiting for the other selectors to seat themselves and watching the odd smile play across Malins’ face.  The men’s scents reached him then, and he realized the problem a split second before the blow hit the back of his knees, dropping him to the ground.  Pain exploded in his temple from a second strike, and he fell forward.  The last thing he recognized before the world went black was the loud crack as his jaw hit the edge of the table, and then he was gone.  
  
*****  
  
Delaney was fuming as she entered the stable.  Aedion was a fool, a damned fool, and to top it all off he seemed to be getting rewarded by the idiots that populated this camp.  Raedan wouldn’t stop crowing about how spectacular the fight had been, or about Aedion’s ferocity as he went after Balam, even after his fingers had been broken.  And that nobody had even told her until after he had already seen the healer and been patched up rankled.  
  
Sparrow was contentedly munching hay in her stall, but the prince was nowhere to be found.  She looked up the aisle, but there was no sign of the golden head in any of the stalls, nor in the far end where the tack was stored.  A gnaw of fear began deep in her gut.  Seeing one of the stable boys carrying a load of hay for one of the horses, she scurried towards him.  “Have you seen Aedion?” she asked as casually as she could.  
  
“Yes’m,” the boy said, “he was here a bit ago.  Then Hale came and fetched him to meet with one of the officers.”  
  
“Thank you,” she said, and walked at a restrained pace out of the barn.  The second she was outside, her feet launched into a dead run towards the office she had seen the visiting men set up that morning.  There were lights shining from the window, and she could see two figures standing outside the building.  Whisper-quiet, she flitted over to the adjoining hut and watched as Balam and Perrington opened the door and entered, a long staff in Balam’s hand.  She stuffed her fist in her mouth to stifle her scream as there was a dull thud, then a crash and a tall  figure fell past the window.  
  
*****  
  
Aedion was floating, drifting on a sea of black.  Somewhere in another world, he was dimly aware that his body was being moved but he felt nothing.  He was safe here in the warm black, and he let himself be carried off, farther and farther from that body.  If the current carried him far enough, he would see them again.  Rhoe and Evalin.  Orlon.  Quinn.  Cal and Marion. Kenway.  His mother…  They were waiting for him off in that endless dark.  
  
*****  
  
A sharp smell grabbed ahold of him and dragged him from the black’s embrace.  He fought the pull, longing to return to the quiet black, but then he was in his body.  His head pounded and his mouth was full of liquid metal.  Blood.  He tried to shift so he could spit but found himself paralyzed, body pressed tightly to something hard, no movement in his arms.  His heart started to race and he opened his eyes, desperate to see where he was.  The light stabbed into his brain and he closed his lids again with a groan.  
  
“Oh, good, you’re still with us,” came a voice he recognized.  He blinked, then squinted, his vision blurry.  The ammonia smell came again and he jerked his head away as much as he could.  His vision cleared more with each blink, and Malins’ face swam into view.  A few deep breaths later and he began to take stock of his situation.  He wasn’t actually paralyzed, but ropes were looped just above his elbows and around each wrist, then attached to rings in the floor he had not noticed before.  Another rope passed under the desk and multiple times over his torso, pinning him down so tightly he could move less than an inch in any direction.  His legs were similarly constricted, though he could not see where they were anchored.  There were two other people in the room, the scents familiar but his brain struggled to pinpoint who they belonged to.    
  
“You had me worried for a moment there,” Malins said, tone and expression the epitome of solicitous concern.   A gentle hand dropped on Aedion’s shoulder, and that’s when he realized he’d been stripped of his clothes.  “After all, you are the most promising prospect I’ve ever come across.  You could be a general someday, with your own forces.  You just need to learn a little lesson.  Do you know what that lesson is, son?”  
  
The term of endearment stung like a whip, and Aedion abruptly realized what was about to happen.  In a panic, he pulled against the ropes holding him, ignoring the painful throb in his left hand and the burning constriction of the ropes.  The wood of the desk groaned, and the sound of a dagger being drawn came in response.  The tip of the knife touched him at the angle of his jaw, right over his throbbing pulse.  
  
Malins continued in a soothing tone.  “Now, son, you don’t want to make this any harder for yourself.  Or for that lovely little doll you’ve taken to your bed.  What’s her name, Delaney?”  Aedion froze at that, and there was a soft laugh from behind him.  “You see, that’s the lesson you need to understand.  Adarlan owns you.  Adarlan owns her.  Adarlan owns everyone.  And if you don’t submit, you will suffer beyond all imagining, and others will pay for your arrogance.”  He took a step back, removing the dagger, and nodded to the men who were standing out of sight.    
  
There was a rustle of clothing, and then he felt hands on his buttocks.   His flinch managed to shift the desk slightly which made the pull on his limbs tighter.  The low laugh behind him told him who one of his tormenters was.  Something hard pressed against his ass, and Balam hissed at him, “This is what little princesses get when they try to show up their superiors.”    
  
Aedion closed his eyes and retreated into his mind, leaving his body to the mercies of Adarlan.  
  
*****  
  
He was standing at the edge of a fast-flowing river.  The ropes holding the bridge had been cut, just frayed remnants fluttering in the cold wind.  His heart had drowned in that black water, and if he followed it he would be out of pain.  He bent his knees, ready to take the leap, when a voice he’d heard once before in a dream sounded.  
  
“She lives.”  
  
He spun around, desperate for the source.  Instead the wind whistled down the road that curved in front of him, leading back to an empty house that had become an abattoir.  Tears welled, then spilled down his cheeks as he turned back to the river.  This time, though the voice sounded again, he jumped.  The freezing water dragged him down, and he surrendered willingly to the current.  The blackness was pulling him towards everyone he had ever loved, and for the first time in two years he felt nothing but relief.  He opened his eyes one last time… There was a flare of light above him.  Fire.  
  
The flame drew him like a moth.  Kicking hard, he drove for the surface, using all his strength to breach.  A rope appeared in the water before him and he grabbed on with both hands, pulling himself to shore, chasing that bright flame.  Dragging himself out, he stood as quickly as he could and looked at the flickering fire far in the distance that coalesced into a golden-haired girl riding a pony.  They were standing on a hill overlooking a city he had never before seen, one dominated by a glass castle.  Just before the girl nudged her pony down the hill, she turned to look back, and the turquoise eyes that glowed in that face were twin to his own.  
  
He ran after her, screaming until he shredded his vocal cords, but she disappeared into the vast city beyond.  Before despair could claim him again a chorus of voices surrounded him, voices he knew, voices he loved, so strong they were nearly tangible.  
  
“Become the weapon you were bred to be.”  “A conquering nation is best destroyed from within.” “You are stronger than they dream.”  “If they break you all hope for Terrasen is lost.”  “Only you can unite those who love Terrasen.”  “Only you can bring Aelin home.  She is lost and cannot find her way.”  The voices of Orlon and Rhoe, Quinn and Kenway, Cal and Evalin.  Then one more, a voice he could barely remember, as deadly as a knife and as soothing as a caress.  “Go back and bide your time.  Hone your rage.  The end of Adarlan is coming, and you shall help usher it in.”  
  
“Aelin,” was all he said in response, a question and a demand.  
  
“She has her own path to walk through the darkness,” came Evalin’s voice.  “She will need you before the end.”  
  
Then Rhoe spoke low and swift, giving him the scaffolding of a plan.  A plan in which Aedion would surrender himself to the enemy in order to destroy it, one that expanded his own barely-formed thoughts into a grand scheme of intrigue and battles, of becoming an enemy to his people in order to save them.  He had known, deep down, that this was the only way, and so he listened, remembering, and his frozen heart began to burn.    
  
*****  
  
Delaney waited inside the darkened building adjacent to the one where Aedion was being held.  When they had lifted his limp, naked body off the floor and tied him down, she had turned away from the window, covering her ears with her hands.  Eons passed before she dared drop her hands, and another age before she heard the door creak open again.  Two sets of footsteps walked away, voices low, the crunching of their feet on gravel obscuring their words.  Silence fell; she braved a look and promptly dropped to all fours and was quietly but thoroughly sick.  Gods, how could even that mighty heart survive being used like that by all three of those monsters?  
  
Pressing her palms into her eyes, she wept silently, raging at her uselessness.  Always too late to prevent, always doomed to bear witness to the aftermath of such suffering.  Eventually footsteps sounded again, and there was a pounding so loud at first she thought she had been found.  Instead voices sounded, urgent but indistinct through the wall.  A door slammed, and three sets of feet set off in three different directions.  She sat and counted, praying all the while to the gods that had forsaken this camp.  When she reached a thousand and nobody had reappeared, she checked the window - no movement inside, though a dim light still shone.  She crept over to the hut.  That building’s back door was locked, so she took two pins out of her hair and quickly picked it, a skill she had learned ages ago and that had proven useful many times over the years.    
  
The door swung open silently, spilling light into the night, and she slipped in and closed it behind her, almost gagging at the rank cocktail of blood, sex, and sweat that met her nostrils.  She scanned the small building, and it was largely empty aside from the desk with its prisoner and some scattered papers and chairs.  Keeping low, below the window sill, she reached the table.  He was tied so tightly the ropes were indenting his skin, and there was a pool of drying blood beneath his face.  His jaw was slack, eyes closed, and she couldn neither see his chest move nor feel his breath.  “Aedion,” she whispered, and there was no response.  “Aedion.  Aedion!” She spoke aloud, nearly shouting his name, but he did not stir.  Trembling, afraid of what she’d find, she pressed two fingers to the hollow below his jaw and almost wept for relief when she felt the pulse surging strong beneath them.     
  
Kneeling, she swept his sweat-matted hair back off his face.  “Aedion,” she murmured.  “It’s me, it’s okay, it’ll be okay.”  Even though she knew she was lying, that there was no going back from where these men had taken him.  “Come on, honey, come back to me.”  Just as she was beginning to despair that he would wake, there was a faint stirring, and he murmured something unintelligible.  “What, honey?  What did you say?”  
  
“Aelin,” he whimpered, and her gut twisted at the sound of his cousin’s name.  He fell silent again, and she started looking at the ropes holding him, noting the purple color of his broken hand.  She began digging through her pockets, looking for her knife, when she heard him say her name in a voice hoarse as though he’d been screaming.  
  
He was looking at her, the one eye she could see easily clear despite being tight with pain.  “Delaney, you’ve got to go.”  
  
“Don’t be ridiculous,” she almost snapped, “I’ve got to get you free.”  
  
“No,” he said, and his eyes fluttered closed again.  “You have to leave.  Now.”  
  
“Aedion, I have to get you out of here.  They’re going to kill you.”  
  
“You have to leave,” was all he replied.  In response, she began picking at the knot that secured his left hand to the ring in the floor.  “I mean it, get out of here.  I don’t want…” he trailed off.  
  
She knew what he was thinking, and it fired up her temper through her fear.  “If you think for one second I’m going to leave you here for those bastards, think again,” she growled, still working on the rope.  “You’re not the first person I’ve cleaned up after they’ve been raped.”  The rope she was holding twanged with the force of his flinch.  She froze, that word hovering in the air between them.  “Shit, Aedion, I’m sorry…”  
  
“I know, sweetheart,” he croaked after a while. “I wish I’d been able to protect you from this, but I think that ship sailed before I ever met you.”  True.  She dragged her eyes to his face, and was startled and a little bit angry at the hint of wry amusement behind the pain.  “I’m not telling you to leave because I’m worried about my modesty.  Or yours.  But they’re going to use you to control me if they catch you.”  He coughed then, and groaned as the movement strained the ropes.    
  
“What?” she whispered.  
  
“Go to the granary,” he said through gritted teeth, “there’s a satchel in that box with some food and clothes and a few other things.  Take it.”  
  
She shook her head, trying to clear it, trying to make sense of what he was saying.  “You want me to leave the camp?”  
  
“I want you to live.”  With those five words, what he was saying finally sunk in.  She rose to her feet slowly.  “You told me once you wanted to go to Rifthold when you turned eighteen.  But don’t go to Rifthold.  Go north.  Stay off the roads until you get to the Acanthus river.”  He coughed again and fell silent for a few moments, eyes scrunched tight, face gray and drawn.  “Once you cross the river, take the East-West road east until you reach the road north to Orynth.  Ask to talk to Lord Darrow.  Tell him…I’m alive.  Tell him I’m finding a way.”    
  
She brushed her hands through his hair again.  “Aedion…”  
  
“Go.  And stay hidden.  If anyone finds you, tell them you’re fleeing a bad engagement.  If they’re from here, tell them you and I quarreled and you fear my temper.”  
  
“I can’t…”  
  
He turned his head as much as his position would allow, enough to press a kiss to her wrist.  “Go,” he mouthed, and there was a sweet kind of love shining in those brilliant eyes.  She stumbled back from him, then out the back door into the black night.  Leaning against the door, she closed her eyes briefly against the sound of her own heart breaking, then gathered herself and flitted through the shadows towards the granary.    
  
*****  
  
The second the door closed behind Delaney, he allowed himself to drift back into unconsciousness.  He felt no fear, no anger; only disappointment when he was prodded yet again from the floating blackness.  As he surfaced, he found the light not quite as painful to his head, though that may have been because the strain on his shoulders and back had surpassed it.    
  
He blinked up at Malins, who wordlessly sliced through the rope binding his left hand, then his right.  Sensation returned with a scream up his nerves, one he had to bite down on to keep from escaping his mouth.  He felt the blood return to his feet next, and nearly pulled the desk over on himself as his legs gave out once they were no longer trapped in place.  Finally, the knife slid between his ribcage and the rope binding his torso.  The second he was free he collapsed on the floor and vomited a foul mixture of stomach acid and blood.  Staying on his hands and knees, he concentrated for a long moment on breathing as every muscle in his body began trembling.  
  
Malins crouched next to him.  “Now, son, tell me where the girl is.”  He looked mutely up at the colonel.  “The laundress.  Delaney.  Where is she?”  
  
He spat some bloody saliva, and probed the inside of his right jaw with his tongue.  At least one back tooth had been knocked loose, he didn’t know how, but it seemed to still be in its socket.  “Probably in her cottage, sir,” he rasped, then retched again for a moment.  
  
“She wasn’t there.  Where else would she have gone?”  
  
“I don’t know, sir.  Maybe the stables, if she was looking for me.  We…” He eased himself into a sitting position, unable to hid his wince as his ass touched the rough floor.  “We had an argument after dinner.”  
  
“Did you now.”  He nodded, looking directly into those cold black eyes.  “What about?”  
  
Now he looked down at the floor, nothing but a humiliated boy admitting to wrongdoing.  “She was angry with me for what I did this morning.  She called me reckless, and I said some…unkind things.”  No doubt what would have happened, had he not ended up here.  
  
The colonel studied him for a bit.  “Are you going to be reckless again, son?” he finally asked quietly.  
  
“No, sir,” Aedion replied, shaking his head and curling in on himself.  
  
“Then go get some sleep.  We’ll see you in the morning.”  With a friendly press of his shoulder, the black-eyed man moved to settle in his chair.  
  
He stood and slowly, painfully, drew on his clothes, ignoring the way Malins was studying him.  Unable to button his tunic or tie his boots one-handed, he shuffled out of the building barefoot, the boots dangling from his right hand.  Once out in the fresh air and out of range of the windows, he stopped to contemplate his options.  While leaping from the watch tower had a strong appeal, he was too tired to climb the stairs.  In the end, he headed for the barracks, hoping he would meet no one on the way.  
  
*****  
  
Delaney took the long way to the granary, keeping to her secret paths that avoided both light and gravel.  She was grateful for the new moon.  There were significantly more than the normal numbers of patrols out tonight, and she suspected they were looking for her.  Visiting her home was out of the question, so she stopped at her other hiding places and collected the small bags of coins she had been squirreling away for years.  It didn’t add up to much, but was better than nothing.    
  
The granary was her last stop, and the most visible one.  She circled it carefully and waited for long minutes in the shadows, rewarded when a soldier sauntered mere feet from her hiding spot.  Once he was safely out of sight, she dashed over to the round building and carefully eased open the door.  Aedion had spoken of a box, and she had to stop to think, picturing the building in her head as it was too dark to search.  Heading for the stairs, she climbed up to the platform where they had first talked; at the far end was a long bench with storage underneath.  She lifted the lid, and sure enough, tucked in one corner among the empty grain bags was a good-sized leather satchel.  She quickly put half her coins in there, tucking the rest in her dress and stuffing some in her socks.  Minutes later she was ghosting back out and disappearing into the shadows, headed for the entrance into the sewers.  
  
She nearly yelped aloud when someone appeared next to her as if they had been waiting for her.  Raedan.  “What are you doing?” he breathed.  “They’re looking for you.”  Then he noticed the satchel.  “You’re leaving, aren’t you.”  She nodded.  He took her elbow and they kept moving, continuing the careful path she had laid out for herself.  “Where are you going?”  
  
“Rifthold,” she whispered back, hating herself for the lie.  
  
They reached the grate that led into the sewers, and it struck her that he knew exactly where she had been going.  She wondered how often he had followed her at night.  Her eyes met his, and he gave her a small, sad smile.  “I’m going to miss you.  Be careful.”  She nodded and gave him a bone-crunching hug before turning away to lift the grate.  She turned back.  
  
“Raedan,” she called softly.  He spun to come back to her.  “Take care of Aedion, will you?  For me?”  
  
He looked startled.  “Sure, but why - Oh.”  Understanding flared in his face, quickly overwhelmed by grief.  “Oh.  Oh, gods, no.”  He shook his head and pressed his fingers to his eyes.  “Why him?” he asked in a despairing tone.  
  
“You know why,” she said.  He nodded and dropped his hand.  Giving him another swift hug, she opened the grate and dropped into the sewer.  Following the course through the pipes she had memorized four years ago, she emerged at the edge of the woods.  On a bright night, she would have been visible from the watch tower, and she thanked the new moon again as she settled the satchel on her back and struck off for freedom.    
  
*****  
  
Somehow, Aedion was unsurprised that Raedan was waiting for him near the barracks.  “Come on,” the smaller boy said.  “Let’s go get you cleaned up.”  He hadn’t even considered the fact that he was covered in blood and gods-knew-what.  This late at night, the baths were empty, and he stood numbly while Raedan filled one for him.  “Do you want help?”  
  
The question spurred him into movement, and he dropped his boots and slowly drew off his clothes while Raedan turned away to give him privacy.  Lifting his feet to climb into the tub was a challenge, and his skin stung as he sank into the hot water.  Grabbing the soap and a cloth that was resting on the edge of the bath, he started to wash the contamination from his skin.  The lightest touch burned like fire when it hit the marks from the rope but he clenched his jaw and scrubbed as hard as he could.  Scrubbed until his skin was raw and fresh blood began seeping into the water.  Scrubbed until the tears began dropping with tiny splashes, until callused hands grabbed the cloth and tugged it free.    
  
“Let me help you, my brother,” Raedan said thickly.  He gently wiped the cloth over his bruised face, tsking at a gash on his jaw Aedion hadn’t even realized he had.  Drawing a bucket of fresh water, he washed the blood from the thick golden hair and rinsed it carefully, touching him as little as possible as if he knew how the feel of hands made his stomach roil.  When he was finished, he pulled the plug and they sat there together listening to the water drain.  Raedan handed him a towel.  “Your fingers will need to be re-splinted, you’ve gotten them soaked,” he said matter-of-factly, as he looked studiously at wall.  “And I think you may need stitches in that cut.”    
  
Aedion paused in the act of drying himself, feeling his breathing ratchet up at the thought of seeing the healer, of having to explain…he began to shake uncontrollably.  Raedan was on his feet in a second, wrapping a dry towel around him, murmuring, “It’s okay.  It’s okay.  Umm…I can splint the fingers, I think, I saw how she did it this morning.  I can’t stitch up your face though.”  
  
“The face will heal,” Aedion replied, and with a response he didn’t hear his friend left the room.  There was a pile of clean clothes on one of the benches, and his own clothes had disappeared.  Huh.  Raedan must have taken care of that.  He wondered when.  Some dim part of him knew he needed to get dressed - he was freezing now that he was out of the bath - but he just couldn’t find the motivation.  When Raedan returned, he found him just sitting on the bench next to the clothes, eyes closed, still shivering.    
  
With soothing words, Raedan carefully undid the soaking wet splints and replaced them, touching him as little as possible.  When the linen strips had bound the fingers tightly, he produced a small packet of sticking plaster and a flask.  “Is it okay if I touch your face?” he asked, and Aedion nodded numbly.  It was the work of moments to get the little plaster strips neatly aligned closing the cut, and then Raedan lifted the flask.  “This is a sleeping draft.  I think you should take it once we get back to the barracks.  But we need to get you dressed.”    
  
Aedion let the boy slip the fresh tunic on and button it, but managed his pants himself.  Once Raedan had tied his boots, they snuck into the bunk room as quietly as possible.  He sat on his bed, listening to the regular breathing of the other boys, studying the flask.  To submit to drugged sleep and be unable to protect himself should the men come for him?   Or to lie in bed and see the monsters creeping through his brain?    
  
He uncorked the flask, downed it in one gulp, and lay down, still shivering despite the heavy blanket.  As sleep claimed him, swift and deep, he pictured Delaney, picking her way through the forest towards safety, towards his home. 


	6. Chapter 6

Aedion paused at the edge of the training field and knelt stiffly to fiddle with his boot.  Not that he could do much to fix it with one hand.  The morning had passed in a blur, and Raedan had been spectacular.  He wondered vaguely how Raedan had come up with the perfect story for his bruised face, but the silly tale of breaking into the kitchens and stealing ale worked, not least because it was something every boy there had done at least once before.  And combining ale with the sleeping draft from the healer probably would have been a bad idea that may well have led to him passing out and smashing his face against the doorjamb and the stoop.    
  
An added bonus was that being hungover was a realistic reason for him to have immediately turned and vomited his guts out when he caught the scent of one of the other boys’ morning release.  And for him barely being able to manage breakfast at all.  
  
But now Raedan was off for his morning of kitchen duty, and Aedion was here facing down the men he trained with.  He took one deep breath, then another.  Pushing the heels of his hands into his thighs, he was just about to rise when a voice behind him said his name.  He surged to his feet, cursing himself for not having heard the approach, and whipped around to see the brown-eyed officer who had complimented him after the fight.  Pulling himself together, he gave the small bow of protocol and waited.  
  
“Sorry, I didn’t mean to startle - good gracious, son, what happened to you?”  
  
Aedion gave as cocky a grin as he could manage.  “Oh, I, uh, took a sleeping draft from the healer last night.  I didn’t realize how quickly it would work.  I don’t remember too much but apparently I went down like a sack of grain in the doorway and hit my head on the doorjamb.”  
  
The man looked skeptical.  “Really?  A sleeping draft?”  
  
His smile turning sheepish, Aedion added, “There may have also been some ale involved…”  
  
The man gave a wry chuckle and shook his head.  “Well, anyway, I’ve been looking for you.  I’d like you to come with me for the morning.”  His voice and aspect were pleasant, and he smelled clean, but still Aedion’s muscles locked up.   He glanced across the field now with longing.  “It’s okay,” the other man said, misinterpreting his look.  “Lieutenant Dale has already been advised that you and a few of the other men will be missing training today.”  
  
The knowledge that he would not be facing the officers alone unfroze him, and he nodded and fell into step.  As they walked, the man introduced himself as Colonel Taber from Anielle.  They ended up back in the dining hall, breakfast being over, and he was relieved to see Torr and Cobden, boys from his barracks, among the men gathered.  The rest were all among the younger set of experienced soldiers who had fought against Terrasen, and Aedion knew them by sight but not name.  They all nodded tightly at each other, and then the officer called for them all to take their seats.    
  
What followed was a session on training strategy that brought Aedion back to his weekly meetings with Rhoe.  Colonel Taber was bright, warm, and engaging, and Aedion soon found himself falling into his old habit of asking questions and debating finer points.  The other men joined in, and soon there was a lively discussion such as he had not witnessed since Orynth.  After an hour or so, the door to the hall opened and two people entered.  He ignored them, caught up in the question one of the young men, Litton, was asking, when abruptly he smelled that peculiar metal scent.  His heart stopped, then ratcheted up to a pace that made him breathless.  When he heard them take a seat, and another, warm human smell hit him, he was able to follow that second scent out of the threatening panic.  Logic spoke up then, reminding him that Malins was hardly going to attack him here in front of everyone, and with an effort he drew his focus back to the conversation.  
  
*****  
It was an effort for Taber to not focus overmuch on the boy.  Despite the fact that he had to be feeling like shit, he was the most animated of the prospects, excelling on drawing the others in.  Between the ferocity and skill of the fight yesterday and blatant intelligence he was displaying today, this Ashryver prince was like no one the colonel had ever seen in his eighteen years of being an officer.  If he proved half as adept as he appeared, he’d be a general by twenty - unheard of in Adarlan.  
  
Taber had a hard time believing Aedion’s story about the sleeping draft.  While those things could knock out a horse, especially if mixed with ale, the careful way he moved indicated further injuries than just the bruises on his face.  Grimly, he remembered the vicious look that Balam man had given Aedion following the dressing-down he received from Lieutenant Dale and wondered.  Not that the prick could have handled the boy on his own, but if he gathered a few of his friends and ambushed him…  
  
Malins and Sanburne entered silently about halfway through the scheduled session, seating themselves unobtrusively by the door behind the table to observe.  Taber didn’t acknowledge them, not wanting to disrupt the rapport building among the recruits.  He couldn’t help but see, though, Aedion freeze when he somehow heard the men and realized who had joined them.  A flicker of panic touched those bizarre eyes and every muscle went rigid for a moment before he shook himself and re-entered the conversation as if nothing had happened.  Taber’s eyes flicked to his colleagues and recognized with a sinking feeling in his gut the look of triumph in Malins’ black eyes.  
  
Not Balam, then.  Malins.  And he knew - they all knew - what Malins did to men he deemed insubordinate.  
  
*****  
  
Staggering with exhaustion, Delaney nearly wept with relief when she saw the rundown old barn in the field.  She had run all night and half the morning through the woods, stumbling over fallen logs and rocks, slipping on wet leaves.  It was her first time away from the fort since she had been a small child, and she had no idea where it was in relation to anything in Adarlan.  All she knew was Aedion’s directive: go north to the river crossing.  Thankfully she’d been around soldiers enough she had learned how to tell direction by the stars, such as she could see through the trees.  Not long after dawn, the forest had thinned and she had skimmed along the edge, staying out of sight of any houses or roads, scanning for a safe place to rest.  The barn door had rotted out, so she just crawled through the hole rather than opening it.  Dragging herself up the ladder into the loft, she collapsed onto the pile of musty hay and was lost to sleep within seconds.  
  
The sun was nearing the horizon when she awoke, chilled and wracked with thirst.  In the light that filtered through the broken wood, she opened the satchel for the first time and sorted through it.  She was startled to find clothes in her size, black lambswool pants like the stable boys wore; a linen tunic from the kitchen maids, and a heavy cream sweater.  Two sets of socks.  Ladies’ underthings.  When Aedion had said there were clothes in there she had expected to be swimming in stuff sized for his freakish frame, but clearly this pack was meant for her.  She wondered when he had hidden it.  Digging deeper, she found a water skin and numerous small packets of dried meat, nuts, and crackers.  The provisions they gave the boys when they practiced scouting.  How long had he been holding his rations back?  This was weeks’ worth, and enough to last her at least a few days if she found nothing else.  A small coil of rope, another of fine wire, a flint, and a knife made up the rest of it.  
  
Shucking her filthy dress, she hurriedly put on the clean, warm clothes.  In the pocket of the pants she found a folded paper - a map, remarkably well-drawn, of Adarlan and Terrasen.  And on the back, a note in his strong hand.  The note seemed mostly nonsense - some story about fire.  She suspected it was not intended for her.  
  
What was he doing now, her lion-hearted friend?  What had her sisters thought when she hadn’t come home?  Raedan would take care of them as best he could, but he was in the barracks and always training or working now.  Her mother… But there was no time to think of any of that now, she needed to find a source of fresh water before it grew dark.  Tucking the map away she crept down the ladder and back through the hole in the door.  If there was a farm, there must be water near by, and sure enough, she found a clean spring that led to a small stream right on the edge of the woods.    She scooped water frantically into her mouth before filling the skin, then settling on a log and chewing on a strip of dried beef.  Pulling the map back out of her pocket, she studied it in the failing light.  The most direct path north would keep her away from what she guessed were mountains inked along the western edge, but would also take her out of the protection of the woods at some point.  She debated the merits of staying more hidden versus speed.  She didn’t know how far she had gone, but doubted she had gotten more than a few miles from the camp.  Finishing the beef and more water, she smacked the map against her leg and stood, her decision made.  She began picking her way carefully along the edge of the woods, the fields just visible to her right, as she put more miles between herself and those who might try to follow.  In another few days she would shift her course, hoping the increased speed from traveling across fields would make up for the visibility.  As the waxing crescent rose, she thought again of her sisters, their hopeful faces and ready laughter, and prayed to the forsaking gods that she had not saved herself only to doom the girls.  
      
*****  
  
Days passed in an unfamiliar mixture of slow haze and sharp clarity.  Most of the time, he felt like a fly caught in sap, slowly drowning while watching the world pass around him.  Then a brief spell of clarity would hit, and he would rise into himself for a few minutes before getting sucked back down.     
  
He was snapped out of his stupor for a little while at dinner the first night, when he saw Avis and Maida sitting silently at the table with downcast eyes.  He set his food down and slid into his usual seat.  Avis looked up at him, a flicker of hope dashing across her face.  “Do you know where Delaney is?”   Shaking his head, he shifted so he was sitting sideways and opened his arms.  Maida ran around the table and flung herself in his lap, and he wrapped one arm around her and tucked her into his chest.  Avis followed more slowly and stopped before reaching him.   Crossing her arms, she glared at him suspiciously.  “Men came.  Men I didn’t know came and asked about her, and then she didn’t come home.”  
  
Aedion closed his eyes for a second to hide the guilt.  He hadn’t even considered what sending Delaney away would do to her sisters, his only thought had been to get her to safety.  “I don’t know where she is, honey,” he replied carefully.  “I do know that she’s smart, too smart to get in trouble.  So if I had to bet, I’d bet that she’s somewhere safe.”  Avis stepped closer to his extended arm, and he encircled her and pulled her in so she could lean on him.  “Delaney would never leave you two without a good reason, you know that.”  Both girls nodded solemnly.  “So let’s trust her.  Let’s trust that she’s doing the smart thing and that she’ll see you again when she can.”  With a gentle squeeze, he released the girls and they returned to their places just as Raedan joined them.  He was looking at Aedion with an odd blend of sadness and pleasure, but he turned almost immediately to claim Maida’s attention.  Aedion began eating mechanically, and all around him the buzzing darkness rose again.  
  
Over the next week the moments of clarity slowly increased.  The only predictable triggers were the daily sessions with the other recruits, and the meals he shared with Delaney’s sisters.  At other times he would suddenly feel as if he’d been shoved out from a dark closet into the sun.  It happened once when a robin flew down and picked a few crumbs from near his feet while he was standing guard.  It happened again when he walked by the laundry and the smell of steam and soap wafted out at him.  Another time it was a bawdy joke Cobden was telling Raedan, and he startled himself - and both of them - with his laugh.  
  
He was standing on guard at the gate when the fog truly began to lift.  Nothing was happening; the usual movements through to and from the market in the town nearby were all finished for the day.  The sun was sinking low in the sky, and as he played with his dagger, the spinning blade kept catching the light.  The resulting flashes looked like flickering flame and suddenly his vision of following flame out of the river returned.  He wished he hadn’t followed it, that he had just let the icy water drag him to oblivion.  The dagger’s movements caught the light again, and he thought idly about what would happen if he drew that honed blade across his wrist.  If he shifted the grip in his hand and plunged it through his ribs.  It would be easy enough; he knew the perfect spot.  Would he be able to be with them again, with Rhoe and Evalin, Quinn, his mother?  With Aelin…but Aelin hadn’t been with them.  He twirled the dagger again, flipping it through his fingers, the temptation to turn it on himself slowly subsiding.    
  
The gate opened and his replacement, a young man who had just graduated to a full soldier, stepped out.  “Oh, Ashryver, Colonel Taber wanted me to tell you to join him in his office, an hour before dinner.”  Aedion stiffened automatically, clenching his jaw tight enough that his ears popped.  The disconcerted man took a small step back away from him, and he realized he was still clenching his dagger.  Striving to soften his expression, he sheathed it and nodded, then gave his report and left.  
  
Half an hour later, he was standing at the end of the line of small buildings, staring down the gravel strip that divided them from the main buildings of the camp.  There was nobody else in the area.  Bile rose in his throat as he looked at the lighted windows of the middle cabin.  He trusted Taber after their week’s acquaintance; but he didn’t trust that Taber was the one who sent the request.  His thumb automatically rubbed over the crescent scar on his palm, the movement slightly disturbing the splint bindings on his fingers.  There was a slight crunch of feet behind him, and he turned to see Litton walking towards him.  He liked Litton; had liked him the little he’d known him before all this, and his respect for the man had grown as they had debated and joked in the group discussions with Taber.  
  
Litton nodded to him.  “Ashryver.”  
  
“Litton,” Aedion replied, swallowing down his nausea.  
  
“Looks like it’s you and me, then.”  Aedion looked at him quizzically, and he explained.  “The officers are leaving tomorrow, so they’re making their selection.  Since they asked us here, I’m assuming they’re choosing us.”  He grinned, but his eyes were serious.  “You ready to be a lieutenant in the Adarlan army?”  
  
Somehow, that this was the reason for the summons had never occurred to him.  He straightened, a light flaring in his turquoise eyes.  “I was born ready.”  
  
Litton laughed.  “Then let’s go claim our birthright, shall we?”    
  
*****  
  
Taber studied the scene before him.  Major Sanburne had settled in the chair behind the desk, flanked by himself and Malins, Ashryver and Litton standing opposite.  Litton looked calm, proud, certain of his advancement.  The prince, on the other hand, had entered the small room looking positively sick.  For a long moment he had fixated on a spot on the floor before dragging his eyes to Sanburne and bowing, an expressionless mask falling over his features. The only indication now that he was not the epitome of composure now was the thumb of his left hand rubbing over his palm repeatedly.    
  
Sanburne began with a nod of acknowledgement to Litton.  “Almire Litton,” he began in his dry voice, “as a result of the way you have acquitted yourself both on the battlefield and in training, you have been nominated to advance to the position of Lieutenant.”  He continued on through the recitation of the standard language of advancement and Taber glanced to Malins.  The man’s black eyes were fixed on Aedion, a smug smirk on his lips.  The boy seemed oblivious but there was a slight flush on his neck and that thumb had not stopped moving.  “Do you hereby accept the commission of Lieutenant in the King’s army?”  
  
“I accept,” Litton said, voice quavering with emotion.  
  
“Aedion Ashryver,” Sanburne said, shifting slightly to face the boy, who met his eyes dispassionately.  “You have also faced battle and by all accounts fought bravely.  Since your absorption into the Adarlan army, you have proven yourself an outstanding fighter…”  As the major droned on, Taber mulled over the choice of language.  Aedion was a first, as far as he knew; not native-born, not a volunteer or nominated by his family.  Raised to lead the armies of Terrasen, and now fighting his way towards the top in Terrasen’s conquerer.  “Do you herby accept the commission of Lieutenant in the King’s army?”  
  
“It will be my honor to accept,” Ashryver answered, with a formal bow.    
  
Sanburne nodded, pleased, and turned the two papers over to be signed by the men.  “You will be expected to report to General Paget in six weeks.  Litton, I understand you have family nearby.”  
  
“Yes, sir.”  
  
“Then I suggest you spend some time with them before heading north.  It may be some time before you see them again.”  
  
“Yes, sir.  Thank you, sir.”  
  
“Asryver, as you have no family on this continent, Major Farrers has offered to have you join his men and spend the next few weeks getting familiar with the workings of the officers in Adarlan.  You are to report to him after dinner.”  
  
“Yes, sir.  Thank you for the opportunity, sir.”  
  
“And in the meantime, why don’t you head to the stables and select your horses.”  Aedion’s mask briefly slipped, and Taber nearly smiled at the surprised pleasure that flashed before it returned.  “Yes, son,” Sanburne said, having caught it as well.  “All officers are assigned a horse.  I had heard you had a fondness for them.”  
  
“Yes, sir.  I spend much of my childhood on horseback, sir.”  
  
“Then off you go.  I look forward to working with you both in the future.”  
  
The new lieutenants both bowed and then strode out of the office.  Sanburne rose and with a nod to the two colonels followed them out, no doubt  eager to grab his usual snifter of liquor before dinner.  Taber turned to Malins.  
  
“Say, what did you talk about in that meeting with Ashryver the other night?”  
  
Malins’ startled look at the question was quickly replaced by one of boredom.  “Oh, I just made sure he understood the importance of the chain of command.”  
  
“I wasn’t aware the boy had an issue with that.  What exactly did you do to ensure that?”  
  
The black eyes flashed, but the man’s tone was neutral.  “Only what was necessary.”  He turned on his heel then and left the office.  
  
Taber went around the desk to see if he could figure out what Aedion had been looking at.  There was a ring set in the floor, a twin to it near the wall.  Looking back at the desk, he saw a dull spot in some of the carving along the edges; closer inspection showed some specks of the dull reddish brown of blood.  He stared out the door where Malins had disappeared, shaking his head in sorrow.    
  
*****  
  
Delaney was startled out of her sleep by a female voice like a knife.  “Well, well, what have we here?”  She sat bolt upright on the musty bed, staring around her in terror, to see a tall woman in the shadows near the cottage door.  After a week of snatching a few hours of sleep in hollows on the frosty ground, this abandoned cottage had seemed like a blessing from the gods.  She should have known there was no such thing.  
  
“I - I’m sorry,” she stammered.  “I thought nobody lived here, and I needed a place to sleep.”  
  
“Indeed.”  The woman prowled closer, the sunlight streaming through the window alighting on her long golden hair.  As her face was illuminated, Delaney’s jaw dropped - with her alabaster skin, large black eyes flecked with gold, and perfect features she was beautiful in a way that belonged to another world.  “And why are you out here all alone, a little delicate thing like you?”  
  
Lowering her eyes, Delaney began the tale of woe she had been perfecting.  “My father died last year.  My mother sold me in marriage, and my husband…” She twisted her hands together.  “He is not a good man.  I fled two weeks ago after he threatened to beat me.”  
  
She looked up to see the woman directly in front of her, though she had not heard her moving.  “And where are you running to?”  
  
“I - I have kin in Orynth.  I’ve never met them, but -“ A long white hand shot out and wrapped around her throat.    
  
“Liar,” the woman hissed, and Delaney felt the sharp prick of nails in the sides of her neck.  With a small click, iron teeth dropped down over the perfect white ones, and all thoughts emptied out of her head except one word: Witch.  
  
“Do you want to try again?” the woman crooned.  “Or do you want to make up another story, so I can have even more reason to spill your guts?”  
  
She fought to retain control over her bodily functions as sheer terror caused her heart to race and her bladder to clench.  Swallowing with difficulty, Delaney whispered, “I was raised in the war camps, I know nothing else.  But then they took my friend.  They took him…” her breathing, already restricted, hitched as she fought not to sob.  “He made it so I could escape, and he told me to head to Orynth.”  
  
The pain in her neck lessened slightly and the woman cocked her head, the movement purely feline.  “What do you mean, they took your friend?”  
  
Tears escaped then, coursing hot down her cheeks.  “They…they tortured him.  They were breaking him, and he told me to leave, and I fled.  I don’t even know if he still lives.”    
  
The woman considered her words, tapping her iron teeth with the iron nails on her free hand.  “And why,” she drawled, dragging out the sound, “would they torture your friend?”  
  
Delaney snorted without humor.  “Because he was strong,” she answered, her voice regaining volume.  “He was stronger than them, and that is the way of men.”  
  
The gold-flecked eyes looked into hers for a long moment, and abruptly Delaney found herself released.  “So it is, young one.”  Delaney sank to the ground, her legs unable to hold her.  The witch studied her, no warmth on her face, just cool calculation.  “This friend of yours, was he your lover?”  
  
“No.”  The witch waited.  “No, he was more like…my adopted brother.”  
  
The woman looked her up and down, taking in her stained clothes, her wan face, her shaking hands.  “When did you last eat, child?”  
  
“Umm.”  She thought.  “I had some eggs yesterday.”  The food, though rationed carefully, had run out a few days ago, and it was too early in the year for there to be much edible in the woods or on the farms.  She’d raided a few henhouses for eggs that she’d sucked down raw straight from the shell.  Even grain left for livestock was beginning to look appealing.  
  
“Wait here,” the woman said, and disappeared through the open door.  She returned shortly with a satchel of her own, and began pulling out several loaves of bread, rounds of cheese, and apples and setting them on the rickety table.  “Eat,” she told Delaney, “then get more rest.  I’ll be back later.”  Before Delaney could gather her thoughts, the beautiful woman - witch - was gone.    
  
Dragging herself to her feet, she stumbled over to the table and grabbed a loaf of bread.  Tearing off a hunk, she crammed it in her mouth, swallowing almost without chewing in desperation for something to fill that angry hollow in her stomach.  Several more mouthfuls followed, then she made herself stop so it wouldn’t all just come back up.  She sat back on the bed and sipped some water and tried to think.  Stories of the witches had been told around camp, hushed whispers designed to keep children awake at night.  Beautiful, immortal beings who bedded men only to bleed them out, getting more pleasure from the blood than the bedding.  Who ate children unfortunate enough to stumble across them.  Delaney was hardly a child but she was no less vulnerable.  She wondered if the stories were wrong, or if this witch was just different.  
  
Once she was sure the food had settled, she ate the rest of the loaf of bread, some of the cheese, and an apple.  Sitting back on the bed, she thought of Aedion, of Maida and Avis, of Raedan.  She hadn’t allowed herself that luxury the past couple of days when the effort of keeping on her feet took all her energy.  Her sisters’ bright smiles, Aedion teasing them, Raedan always checking in on them all made her lips twitch into a small smile of her own.  Then images of Aedion flashed across her brain, of him bound and bleeding on that table; of him whispering his cousin’s name with pain dulling his eyes; of him laid out gray and cold, eyes staring sightlessly at the sky.  She scrubbed at her face with her hands, trying to drive the thoughts out, only to see pictures of Avis sobbing under a soldier, Maida wasting away with scabs on her lips, Raedan falling with an arrow in his chest.  Curling into a ball, she wept for her family until eventually sleep dragged her under.  
  
*****  
  
Aedion struggled to keep his pace limited to Litton’s as they headed over to the stables.  His own horse…he hadn’t had that luxury in two years.  He all but burst through the door, heading straight to Sparrow’s stall to earn a pinned-eared glare.  Litton stood in the aisle looking a little bit lost.    
  
“Hey, boy,” called the stable master, Darel, from down the aisle.  “Where’ve you been this past week?  Half these horses are kicking down the stalls and I’m running the boys ragged trying to get them all ridden.”  
  
Aedion grinned as he turned to him, holding up his splinted hand.  “Hard for me to do too much with this.”  
  
“Oh, aye, I heard about that.  Still don’t know how you let that old bastard do that, no doubt your mind was on your cock and your lady friend instead of your job.”    
  
Litton swelled with indignation.  “You are addressing a lieutenant in the King’s army.”  
  
Aedion just laughed as Darel turned a baleful eye to the other man, then looked back to him.  “So they picked you, eh?   Ah, well, they’d be fools not to.  I suppose you’re here to pick out your horse, then?”  
  
Litton replied in the affirmative, and Darel pointed down the aisle.  “There’s some available ones at the end, go down and take your pick.”  Aedion gazed wistfully at Sparrow.  “Nah, you can’t have your old bitch-mare, but i got half a dozen new ones for you to look over.  Even grabbed a couple mares since I know you like the ladies.”  He followed Litton and Darel to the end of the barn, where several curious faces popped over their stall doors to see who had come to visit them.  Litton immediately headed to the large black stallion in the farthest stall, while Aedion spent a few minutes looking each horse over carefully.  He came back to the first horse, a tall, narrow seal brown mare with a white spot on her forehead, and offered her his empty palm to sniff.  She lipped at it and then gave him a disappointed look and he chuckled.    
  
Darel gave a broad smile that showed several missing teeth.  “That’s the one I picked out for you, son,” he said, sounding pleased.  “She’s the best-bred one of the lot, her great-granddaddy was full Asterion.  Got a great bargain on her at the sales.”  
  
“Why?” Aedion asked cautiously.  
  
The older man rubbed the back of his neck.  “Oh, ah, she’s a bit green is all.”  
  
“How green?”  He didn’t mind a green horse too much, having ridden quite a few over the past eighteen months, but he’d rather not have to fight one every second to stay in the saddle.  
  
“Well, she knows how to steer pretty good.  And on a good day she’ll even stop.”  
  
Aedion laughed and the mare pricked her ears at the sound.  He rubbed small circles over the white spot on her forehead until she half-closed her eyes.  “Well, that’s fine, worst case scenario I can just leap off when we get there.”  Darel’s toothless grin grew.  “You don’t think she’s too slight for me though, do you?  I’m not going to get any smaller with time.”  
  
“Aye, but neither is she.  You just both need a bit more muscle.  Speaking of which, you best go get your nose in a feed bag, son, you look half-starved.”  The old man left him then with a hearty slap on the back.  
  
Litton stepped closer as soon as the stable master was out of earshot.  “You shouldn’t let him disrespect you that way.”  
  
Aedion shrugged.  “He didn’t mean any harm, it’s just his way.  If he didn’t respect me he’d bow to my face and then mock me behind my back.”  
  
The other man shook his head.  “I can see you know him pretty well, but even so, you’re an officer now.  These men need to have a little fear in order to follow you.”  
  
Aedion pursed his lips, debating with himself for a moment before asking, “Who’s your father?  Where did you grow up?”  
  
He looked a little confused at the non sequitur, but replied, “I’m the second son of Lord Litton of Pernel.”  
  
Aedion nodded.  “I’m guessing you’ve never spent much time with ordinary people except as part of your assigned work here?”  Litton shrugged, and Aedion went on.  “It’ll be easy to get people to fear you, you’re the son of a lord and an officer of the King.  You could slaughter them all with no repercussions.  But if you can get them to love you, then they’ll jump in front of a sword to save you, and that’s everything.”  Litton still looked skeptical.  “Look, I can kill Darel with my bare hands, and we both know it.  But I don’t make him feel it.  I joke around with him, and do my work and help out where I can, I treat him like he matters.  Because he does.  His life is worth as much as mine.  And that’s why,” he said, grinning, “he went to the sale and got me this horse.”  He laid a hand on the glossy black-brown neck.  “This mare is worth more than the other five he bought put together, green or no, and he bought her for me.  Not even knowing yet that I’d make lieutenant.  Understand?”  
  
Litton studied him, a peculiar expression on his face.  “You’re an interesting man, Lieutenant Ashryver.”  He clapped Aedion on the shoulder, gave the mare a long look, then turned and walked away.  
  
*****  
  
The golden-haired woman shook Delaney roughly awake.  “Come with me,” she said, and she turned on her heel and stalked out the door.  Delaney rubbed the sleep from her eyes and followed her into the dusk.  A small, sorry-looking horse stood there with loaded saddle bags.  She blinked, wondering if she was hallucinating or still dreaming.  
  
“What…” she didn’t know what to ask, what to say.  
  
“You’ll never get to Orynth the rate you’re going,” the woman said.  “This will help you.  There’s some food and clothes in the saddle bags, and a few other things.  Ride until you get to the next inn, then stop there for the night.  Make sure you go through all your things carefully.  With the horse you should be able to stick to the roads and make better time.  If they’re looking for you, they’ll be looking for a girl on foot.”  
  
The ready tears started up again.  “But why?” She turned to the beautiful woman in honest bafflement.  “Why are you helping me?”  
  
The woman rubbed her pale hand over her abdomen and looked off to the south, towards the camp.  “Because somebody down there thinks you’re worth sacrificing their life for.  No reason for that to be in vain.  Now, go quick.”  
  
Delaney mounted awkwardly, being no horsewoman, and turned the nag up the overgrown drive that led to the main road.  As they headed away, she turned in the saddle to look back at the woman who stood watching, one hand still resting on her abdomen, an inscrutable expression on that stunning, wild face.  Delaney raised a hand in farewell, and with a slight nod the woman disappeared into the gloom.  Turning back to the road, she kicked the horse into a bouncy trot and headed north, the vast stars arching overhead urging her onward.    



	7. Chapter 7

It was just past dawn, the edge of the sky still streaked with pink and gold, when Aedion slipped into his horse’s stall and started getting her ready for their journey north.  He had named the mare after the dark queen in Aelin’s favorite storybook as a child.  He’d read it to her so much that even now he could recite large passages of it by heart.  The dark queen Avenar had the mark of the crescent moon on her forehead that showed only in starlight, and she controlled spiders and owls and all the creatures of the night.  Men fell to their knees when they beheld her beauty and she scorned them all, all except the sun king, who wooed her with his bright power until one day they were wed before all the people in the land.  The name fit the mare, with her white half-moon-shaped spot on her forehead, her near-black coat…and the fact that she had taken a chunk out of Litton’s stallion when the other horse had tried to flirt.  
  
Avenar seemed to be the one solid thing in what had been a very surreal few weeks.  He had reported to Major Farrers' annex of the main house as ordered, to find himself promptly adopted by Mrs. Farrers as if he were a long-lost son.  He had known her for most of his tenure in the camp, being the person most often responsible for taking her and the other ladies on their occasional rides, a task he had always enjoyed.  It was a little disconcerting, though, to have her suddenly fussing over how much he ate, the state of his socks, and the grime embedded in the linen wraps holding his splints in place.  The major himself had likewise been solicitous, and Aedion had learned quite a lot in a short time about the politics inherent in the Adarlan army.  He suspected his status as a prince of Wendlyn was more responsible for his welcome than any personal trait of his own, but he was not going to complain.  The night before, when he went to take his final leave of them, the major had given him a fine new dagger and Mrs. Farrers had presented him with a beautiful new hooded cloak of warmest wool and lined leather gloves.  He had kissed her cheek in thanks, and she had gone quite pink and fanned herself before shooing him out with orders to write her regular letters on his progress.  
  
This despite the incident a few days earlier with Balam.  The prick had evidently been sent on some sort of mission after the fight, and had returned in a foul mood a week ago.  Since his reappearance he had taunted Aedion at every opportunity, which Aedion had persistently ignored.  Technically, as a lieutenant he now outranked the older man, but he had not pressed that advantage.  Instead he had bided his time, until the morning Dale had him running the sparring practice.  When Balam prowled into the ring near the end and made some snide comment about the camp going to hell now with the princess running the session, Aedion had waved him over.    
  
“I’ll tell you what.  Let’s clear this up right now.  You’re sparring with me today.  No weapons, just hand-to-hand.  Ten minutes, and we’ll see who is the better man.”  
  
“Hand-to-hand, eh?” He glanced down at Aedion’s still splinted fingers.  “Am I supposed to tie one hand behind my back to make it fair?”  There were a few snickers among some of the older men, but most of the others looked a little uneasy.  He didn’t know if it was because they thought he was at a disadvantage, or because they sensed the shift in him.  
  
“No.”  Aedion gave his laziest smile.  “I don’t need two hands to beat you.”    
  
Dale had been standing behind him for this exchange, and Aedion glanced back at him; when he received a nod, he headed into the ring, brushing past the sputtering Balam as if he were a hat rack.  When they faced up Balam snarled, quietly enough only he could hear, “Just you wait, you snotty little princess.  I’ll fuck you in the ass again before I’m through.”  
  
Aedion slid into an icy rage, one that tapped deep into the reserves that he had long suppressed.  He had never used his full strength in sparring, never his full speed, Rhoe’s admonitions to be cautious with his fae heritage always sounding in his ears.  The whistle sounded and Balam lunged forward, trying to use his superior weight to throw Aedion off-balance.  He side stepped easily, sending Balam stumbling past, and they continued to dance.  Over and over Balam charged in swinging, Aedion evading him with his feet or blocking with his forearm but not even trying to land a punch.  He waited until the man, nearly roaring with fury, set up for a rush, then Aedion stepped in with a crushing blow that landed precisely on the point of Balam’s chin, launched with all the speed and strength he could muster.  Balam’s head snapped back, the light left his eyes, and Aedion had turned and was walking off the pitch before the man had finished falling.    
  
He ignored the people rushing past him towards Balam, calling for a healer; ignored the other men who were staring at him, mouths gaping; ignored even the savage clapping from the younger ranks he heard increasing in volume as he stalked away.  Raedan found him a little later in his old barracks ruminating over a toilet, and dropped to the floor next to him.  “It was Balam?” he whispered.  Aedion didn’t ask how he knew.  
  
Aedion retched again.  “Among others,” he ground out against the surge of bile.  When his stomach took a break, he glanced at the other boy to gauge his response.    
  
“How many?” Raedan breathed, looking nearly as sick as Aedion felt.  
  
He held up three fingers, and Raedan cursed under his breath.  “Balam was always kind of a bastard, but I didn’t think he would’ve…I had just figured it was that officer, Malins, that’s who scared the shit out of my sisters looking for Delaney.”  Remembering Malins' metallic scent almost made Aedion vomit out his liver, or at least that’s what it felt like.  “Gods, Aedion, you can’t keep going like this.”    
  
Aedion rested his forehead on his arm, cold sweat soaking through his shirt.  “I’m all right.”  
  
“Bullshit.”  They were silent for a long moment before Aedion picked up on what Raedan had said.  
  
“Wait.” He turned bleary eyes to his friend.  “What do you mean was?  Me knocking him out doesn’t change anything, he’s still a bastard.”  
  
Raedan shook his head slowly.  “No, Aedion.  Was.  The healer said he ruptured a blood vessel in his brain?  I don’t know what that means, but he was dead when he hit the ground.”  
  
*****  
  
The rising sun was glaring off the white walls of the city rising up in front of her, and tears stung Delaney’s eyes.  It had taken her almost a month to get here, between the spring squall that closed down the road for several days and then Horse throwing a shoe and going lame.  She never would have made it were it not for that golden-haired witch.  The night after that chance encounter, she had rented a room at the first inn she passed.  As the woman had suggested, she had sorted through the saddle bags as soon as she was locked in her tiny room.  In addition to some food and a small bag of silver, there was a brick of brown hair dye and clothes like those farm boys wore.  There was also a pair of scissors and a note in a jagged hand: For hiding in plain sight.  Going to the mirror, she had carefully unbraided her long, thick reddish-gold hair, the pride of her mother.  Grasping the scissors, she cut the hair off at the level of her jawline, exposing the back of her neck.  She continued to hack at her hair until it fell in a shaggy rough mop.  The brick of dye was then put into service in the bathing room.  A tightening of the binding around her breasts and a change into the homespun clothes and she looked like any average brown-haired, green-eyed farm boy.  In truth, she looked rather like Raedan, only a little shorter.     
  
She was stopped on the road the very next day and questioned.  Her voice was rather deep for a girl’s, and by adopting the irregular shifts in tone she had always teased Raedan about while his voice changed, she was able to ask the soldier’s queries convincingly.  He let her pass on, asking her to let someone know if she encountered a lost girl with strawberry hair.    
  
Not a day went by that she didn’t think of that unknown witch, not a night when she didn’t dream of her.  What started out as nightmares of iron nails shredding her flesh soon shifted, and she wondered what those same nails would feel like in a caress.  Wondered if her skin was as fair and unmarred everywhere as it was on her face.  Wondered what her lips would taste like, what those flecked black eyes would look like hooded in passion.  So she would jolt awake, body aching for a touch she had never known, then ride all day only to fall asleep with the same craving.  
  
Shaking herself out of her reverie, she halted Horse and gazed in some awe at the tall, ornate city gates that were just opening for the day.  Horse sighed heavily, then ripped the reins through her hands to crop a little of the early spring grass.  She had developed kind of a grudging relationship with the creature; she needed him a lot more than he needed her, and they both knew it.  As long as he went along the road at some sort of forward clip when she asked him too, at every stop, no matter how brief, he would eat.  Bushes, early leaf buds on trees, grass, Horse wasn’t picky.  The gates ahead of them finished opening, and Delaney hauled his head up with some difficulty and kicked him forward to join the small queue.  The guards nodded to everyone, their faces kindly but a bit grim.  
  
As she passed through the gates and looked up at the mass of buildings that rose in front of her, she realized that she had absolutely no idea where she was supposed to go.  Aedion had given her a name, but nothing else.  So she followed the small line of people and wagons and ended up at the market square.  Dismounting, she led Horse carefully between the stalls, listening for any information, but all she heard was the standard haggling over prices and gossip about people she’d never heard of.  Finally, she stopped at the stall of a woman selling bread and pastries, and dug two coppers out of her last handful to buy a roll.    
  
“Is there an inn nearby?” she asked politely  The woman looked at her strangely and then jerked a thumb over her shoulder; Delany followed the gesture to see a peeling sign for the Three Pigs Inn.  “Thank you, ma’am,” she said, “I’ve never been to the city.”  The baker’s face softened and she smiled.  
  
“Ah, well, then, the Three Pigs is a decent place, no bugs.”  Delaney nodded her thanks and began to walk away, turning when she heard the woman whistle.  A sweet bun soared through the air towards her, and she caught it automatically.  “Welcome to Orynth.”  She thanked the woman again and dragged Horse in the direction of the inn, fighting him for her share of the sweet bun.  
  
There was a small stable adjacent to the inn, and a boy hustled over to grab Horse for her.  She pulled off his saddle and her bags, slinging the latter over her shoulder and dropping the saddle where the boy indicated.  Handing him a copper, she headed for the entrance.  The innkeeper nodded to her, and she purchased a room and food for herself and Horse for the next few days with one of the witch’s silver pieces.  She settled herself into the small, clean room and after a quick wash went back down to explore.    
  
Negotiating the streets was much easier without a large ornery animal, and she spent a pleasant hour getting swept up in the bustle of the city.  Everywhere were bright colors, delicious smells of cooking food, the chatter of voices and the warmth of bodies.  Eventually made her way to the foot of the castle, and was startled to find the large, ornate gates twisted and collapsed, half off their hinges.  Men in uniform guarded the entrance and eyed her suspiciously as she stood, gaping at the destruction and what lay beyond.  _Aedion had lived here_ , she thought.  He had had lessons and trained and played with his little cousin here.    
  
The glorious white walls of the castle and its tower still rose gracefully overhead, but it felt deserted.  No lords and ladies were coming and going, no bright-haired children running over the still-manicured lawns.  She wondered idly who was doing the gardening, and why they were bothering.  Every single person who had lived and loved and ruled from this mighty palace had been slaughtered by the King of Adarlan.  Except her friend, who had somehow survived but who might yet have met the same fate after she left him bound at the mercy of those men.  
  
In a daze, Delaney headed back to her room at the inn.  This time she noticed the other details: the garbage collecting along the edges of the cobbled roads; the wear and stains on the bright clothes; the families clustered on street corners with gaunt faces and hollow eyes.  Rushing through the entrance and up the stairs to her room, she barely managed to close the door before racking sobs hit her.  
  
*****  
  
Aedion heard two people enter the stables as he readied Avenar and nodded at Litton as he passed.  He was glad they were going to Paget’s together, and not just because Litton knew the way having been there prior to the war with Terrasen.  Since the fight with Balam, nearly everyone in camp was treating him differently, with an excess of either awe or suspicion.  Just Raedan and his sisters, the Farrers, Litton, and Torr had not changed their attitudes.  Well, and Darel, but Aedion suspected he could have sprouted horns and started goring everyone in sight and the stable master would’ve just told him to quiet down and stop scaring the horses.     
  
After Raedan had told Aedion about Balam, he had rushed from the toilets in search of a superior officer.  By some stroke of luck Major Farrers was the first he encountered, talking soberly with a pair of men at the edge of the pitch.  He had waited respectfully for them to finish, and when the men had turned he recognized them as Dale and Litton.  The young lieutenants had each given him a small smile and nod as they passed, and then Aedion was facing his mentor and bowing, completely uncertain of what to say.  
  
When he straightened, Farrers was looking at him with what bafflingly appeared to be pride.  “That was a hell of a fight, son,” was all the major said before turning and gesturing him to follow.  Out on the pitch, several men were lifting Balam’s body, and Aedion felt another wave of nausea at the sight.  He followed Farrers to the house they shared, and sat silently in one of the comfortable armchairs the major waved him to.  Pouring a glass of brandy, Farrers sat opposite him.    
  
“I’d give you one of these but you’re a mite young,” he said, sipping.  “Well, lieutenant, I’ve got to say, I’ve been doing this for a lot of years and I’ve never seen anyone fight like that, let alone a sixteen year old.  You present a bit of a conundrum, my boy.”  
  
“I didn’t intend to kill him,” Aedion blurted out, having no idea where this was going but needing to make that clear.  “I just wanted to make a point.”  
  
The major snorted.  “I know that, son, and you sure made it and then some.  That’s why you’re going to have to figure something out once you get to General Paget’s.  See, you need to keep practicing or you’ll lose some of your skill, but if you keep getting stronger it’ll be too dangerous.“  
  
Aedion gaped at him in shock.  “Get to General Paget’s…But sir, aren’t I being disciplined?”  
  
“Whatever for?”  Farrers seemed genuinely surprised.  “It was a fair fight; more than fair, given you were surrendering the advantage on account of your hand.  It was a bit unfortunate, that’s all.”  He smiled indulgently at Aedion before continuing.  “Now, the one thing I’m a bit unhappy with you about is that you didn’t report his insubordination beforehand.”  It actually hadn’t occurred to him to do so, and he said as much.  The major nodded.  “I know it can be a bit hard to get used to outranking men older than you, but you best figure it out because pretty soon you’re going to outrank just about everyone.  Anyhow, after today, I don’t think you’ll have to worry about anyone mouthing off at you, here at least.”  
  
The major had certainly been right about that; most of his fellow soldiers barely even talked to him, and some of the younger boys with whom he had been working for months now squeaked and bowed nervously every time he came near.  He hated them all for their fear.  It was a relief to be leaving.  This camp had little to hold him now except Delaney’s siblings.  
  
That had been his hardest good-bye.  Raedan had been nowhere to be found.  Avis and Maida had both clung to him crying and ordered him to be careful and to write often, a promise he was glad to make.  He hoped that somehow they got out of there before they got too much older; he almost couldn’t bear to leave them there unprotected.  He wondered if he could somehow find a way to get them to Paget’s camp where he could look after them.    
  
Finally he had Avenar’s tack set and saddlebags checked.  The sword he had been provided was buckled onto his hip, and the quiver and unstrung bow slung over his shoulder.  He took one of his knives and carefully sliced through the linen strips binding his splints, then pulled them off.  His hand felt unnaturally light without them, his fingers stiff and sore as he flexed them, but the bones were sound.  With a deep breath, he turned and led Avenar out of the stable for the last time.  
  
Darel came out to say a gruff farewell while he waited for Litton, and Aedion was teasing him about having to pull his own weight for once now when he heard not one but two sets of hooves clopping down the aisle.  Litton appeared with his black stallion, and behind him was Raedan leading a smaller chestnut.  Aedion looked at him quizzically.  
  
Raedan waved a paper around excitedly, startling Avenar.  “I got my transfer papers!  I’m going with you!”  Litton was grinning, clearly in on it;  Darel was chuckling at his surprise.  
  
“Wait, what?  How the hell did you arrange that?” he asked while holding on firmly to his plunging mare.    
  
Raedan’s jumble of words was barely intelligible.  “So, when you two were selected they put out a call for pages willing to be transferred since officers always travel with a page, and I put my name in.  I found out last week I was selected and so here I am.”  
  
“But,” Aedion shook his spinning head, trying to make sense of this stroke of luck, “you’re not a page, you’re training to be a soldier.”  
  
“I was a page for years though, until a couple months before you got here.”  He shrugged with false casualness.  “It’s not that uncommon for people to do both.”  Litton’s expression told him it really was that uncommon, but he wasn’t going to argue.  He led Avenar over so he could squeeze Raedan’s shoulder.    
  
“Thank you, brother.”  The three of them swung into their saddles and turned towards the gate.  Several of the camp officers and regulars were standing near the gate to see them off, and behind them were the subtle sounds of the camp wakening.  As they jogged their horses through the gate and headed down the hill, Aedion turned to Raedan.  “What about your sisters?  Won’t they be upset you’re leaving too?”    
  
Raedan just grinned.  “Not likely.  It was Avis’ idea to begin with.”  Aedion laughed.  Avenar tossed her head and pulled at the bit, but listened reluctantly to Aedion’s gentle check.  Soon they were riding out of the camp’s long shadow, blinking in the early morning sun before they reached level ground and turned north.  
  
*****  
  
Once Delaney had cried herself out, she went in search of a way to get in touch with the lord Aedion had told her to seek out.  She had spent much of her time while traveling planning on what she would say to the man.  Why Aedion had told her to seek him out, what their relationship was, she had no idea.  A thousand different introductions and explanations had run through her head.  
  
It had never occurred to her that she would not be able to meet with him in the first place.  
  
Finding a courier in the city was easy.  Finding one who was willing to carry a message from her to Lord Darrow proved impossible.  When the sixth one said he would be unable to help her, she finally asked why.  
  
“What could a farm boy from central Adarlan possibly have to say to Lord Darrow of Terrasen?” the man had replied, the scorn in his voice like a slap.     
  
That was when she realized that she was a foreigner.  Aedion’s accent had earned him no little teasing early on in his sojourn at camp, but it had become so familiar to her that she hadn’t really recognized that she was now in a city full of people with that same rich, warm tone. Her sharper enunciation marked her immediately as a citizen of the conquerer.  But she was here now, and needed to find a way to reach this lord.  She owed that to her friend.  
  
Back at the inn, she washed her clothes and rinsed the dye from her hair.  She would find a way to stay in the city until she figured out how to reach the lord.  It was time for her to get a job.  
   
*****  
  
They had nearly three weeks before they were expected at Paget’s camp.  In perfect weather, it was a twelve day ride, but spring storms were common and could be violent especially farther north.  Heavy snow had closed down a number of the roads just two weeks prior, and there were still some patches of snow and ice that needed to be avoided.  Litton and Raedan were good travel companions, and both conversation and silence flowed naturally.  Avenar settled into the rhythm of walking and trotting, and after perhaps an hour stopped trying to pull Aedion’s arms from his sockets.    
  
The first night it was well after dark when they came to a small inn.  After getting the horses settled into the stables, they entered to find that there were only two rooms available.  Aedion didn’t care; he hadn’t even thought about having his own room; but Litton and Raedan were concerned.  The latter offered to sleep in the stables but Aedion, with an exasperated sigh, grabbed him by the back of his tunic and dragged him up to one of the available rooms, leaving the other to Litton.  After a quick wash, they met back down in the tavern for dinner.  
  
The room was crowded, packed with travelers and townsmen and women.  The officer’s insignias on Litton’s and Aedion’s coats earned them a clear table, and soon they were digging into a venison stew, richly seasoned and packed with mushrooms and onions.  Exhausted, Aedion just wanted to eat and find his bed, but Litton was scanning the crowd.  After polishing off his bowl with more haste than grace, he excused himself and disappeared into the crowd.  The others watched in some bemusement as he approached a woman dining alone at another table; after a few minutes of smiling conversation, she took his arm and they disappeared up the stairs.  
  
“Damn,” Raedan said, shaking his head.  “He works fast.”  Aedion just nodded in admiration.  He couldn’t imagine walking up to some woman he didn’t know and inviting her to his bed.  Tossing a coin from the purse he had been given on the table, he headed up to bed himself, Raedan behind him.  He barely managed to undress before falling into bed.  Across the room, he heard Raedan settling into the cot the innkeeper had provided.  He had offered to take the cot himself, but Raedan had pointed out that his feet would be hanging off and he had submitted to that logic.  
  
Just as he was nodding off, a distinct rhythmic squeaking sound became audible through the wall, soon followed by indistinct moans.  He flung his arm over his eyes and tried to ignore it, but the noises got louder.  Raedan started to laugh.  
  
“Is that…Litton?” Aedion finally asked.  
  
“Seems to be, it’s his room on that side,” Raedan replied.  There was a muffed cry and a pause for a few minutes before the squeaking resumed.  “What the…is he going again?”  
  
It appeared that he was.  Pretty soon a thumping began to sound against the wall, and Aedion gave up on all hope of sleep, especially as his cock reminded him that it was being left out of the revelry.  He squirmed.  There was only a shared bathing room in this inn, so no real opportunity to provide himself with some relief.  
  
“If you wanted some company, I really don’t mind sleeping in the stable,” Raedan said, as if he could hear his thoughts.  
  
“I’m not kicking my brother out into the cold,” Aedion growled.  “Besides, I wouldn’t have the foggiest idea how to go about getting a woman.”  Or what to do with one once I had her, he didn’t add.  The noise on the other side of the wall reached a crescendo, and there was a faint crash as if a lamp had been knocked over.  Raedan was seized by a fit of the giggles.  “I think I should be taking notes,” Aedion quipped, setting them both howling.    
  
Finally the sounds abruptly ceased, and the two boys got their laughter under control.  A long period of quiet followed, and Aedion was starting to get sleepy again when Raedan asked, “You and Delaney really didn’t ever…”  
  
“No, Raedan,” Aedion replied, a smile in his voice, “I never fucked your sister.”  
  
“Oh, gods, I didn’t even…” He trailed off, and Aedion could just about hear him blushing.  
  
“Why is everyone so convinced we did?”  It was a question he had long wanted to ask.  
  
There was a slight sound of fabric shifting, as if the other boy had shrugged.  “I don’t know,” he finally said.  “It’s just, you guys were always together.  And you would touch each other all the time, without even thinking.  Delaney never did that with anyone, except us.  My family, I mean.  So, it just made sense, you know?”  The room was quiet except for the squeak of the cot as Raedan shifted.  “And she deserves that.  She’s always taken care of us, of everyone, and you…you took care of her, and I wanted that for her.”  
  
Aedion mulled this over.  Physical affection had always come as naturally to him as breathing, but at first Delaney had shied away from his arm across her shoulders, or the light kisses he’d drop on her hair.  She’d warmed to it quickly, and it was nothing that he hadn’t done a thousand times with Aelin or Evalin, or little Elide, but if that wasn’t typical for her he could see why it might be interpreted as more.  “I never wanted to mislead anyone,” he finally answered.  “And she does deserve that.  She deserves every happiness, but she never wanted that from me.  She was as content with our…adopted sibling thing as I was.”  
  
“I still don’t understand why you two didn’t fall in love.”  
  
It wasn’t for Aedion to say; if Delaney had wanted Raedan to know she was not drawn to men, she would have told him.  He settled for, “It wasn’t meant to be, I guess.”  Soon the silence between them shifted into dreams, and he dreamt of Delaney standing frozen before the towers of Orynth, waiting for him.  
  
Aedion had gotten up, dressed, and fed the horses before the tavern had opened for breakfast.  He was the first guest there, and the staff fussed over him politely while they brought him a tremendous spread.  A few other people trickled in, and soon Raedan joined him.  There was no sign yet of Litton.  
  
“Well,” Raedan said grinning when Aedion commented on it, “I’d be a bit slow to rise too if I’d had a night like that.”  They both laughed at the pun, but Aedion found himself wondering.    
  
“Have you ever?” he asked.  
  
Raedan flushed to the roots of his hair and nodded, trying and failing to suppress a grin.  “A few times.”    
  
Aedion punched him lightly on the arm.  “And you didn’t tell me?  Who?  How?”  
  
The grin grew.  “You know Gwinnie, from the kitchens?  I was helping put stuff away one night after dinner, it was before - before Delaney left.  We were alone in the storeroom and I’d always kind of liked her and she knew it.  She asked me if I was ever going to kiss her.  So I did, and then we ended up back at her cottage.  The next thing I knew, we were in her bed.”  
  
Aedion shook his head.  “I just can’t believe you didn’t tell me.”  
  
Before Raedan could reply, Litton appeared looking pleasantly tired.  “Did you have a good night’s sleep?” Aedion asked innocently.  Raedan kicked him under the table and he bit the inside of his cheek hard to keep a straight face.  
  
 Litton looked briefly startled, then replied casually, “I suppose so, yes.”  
  
Raedan interjected, “More to the point, did she?”  Both boys broke up laughing then, and Litton looked from one to the other.  
  
“You bastards, you’re just jealous,” he finally said with a grin, and reached for the toast.  
  
*****  
  
It took Delaney three days to find a job.  It was Horse who actually secured it for her; she was riding him out for some exercise when she was flagged down by a gray-haired gentleman who needed someone willing to carry an urgent message to one of the country houses outside the city.  She earned five coppers for it, and when she returned with a reply, the man asked her if she’d be willing to be a messenger boy for him.  She agreed with alacrity, though explained she was new to the city and didn’t know her way around yet.  He introduced himself as Clery, armed her with a map, and she delivered a dozen more letters that day to businesses all over the city.    
  
When she appeared while he was finishing breakfast the next morning, Clery squinted up at her from his chair.  “Bit eager, are you, Layne?”  It was the name she had been going by since she cut her hair, a common enough peasant boy’s name and similar enough to her own that she had no trouble recognizing it.  She apologized, and he grinned and handed her another stack of letters.    
  
The addresses this time were a bit of a puzzle.  Two of the letters went to prosperous farms not far outside the city gates.  Half a dozen went to some of the largest private residences she had ever seen, where the ornately carved doors were opened by liveried footmen and she was shown into richly decorated parlors.  Several others went to various grocers and shops.  Two went to lawyers.  And four or five were delivered in what could only be called the slums, rundown buildings packed with people, where ragged children ran wild in the streets.  In each case, the letter was promptly read and a brief reply written at the bottom of the page before it was re-sealed.  The sun was nearly down before she returned to Clery’s house - a pleasant well-built home that was not ornate in the slightest, on what appeared to be a quiet, ordinary street.  He briefly checked the seal on each letter, then handed her a silver coin and bade her to be back the next day.  Horse was exhausted, and she hoped most of the next day’s deliveries would be in the city so he could have a break; she had realized that riding was a handicap on the narrow cobbled streets.  
  
The innkeeper greeted her with a smile, and Delaney gave her the silver coin to cover the next few days.  “Hear you’re doing some work for old Clery,” the woman commented as she took the coin.    
  
“Yes,  ma’am,” Delaney replied.  
  
“I’m a little surprised he took you on, given where you’re from.  Then again, could be that’s the reason, he’s a clever old fox.”  Delaney gave her a questioning look, but the woman waved her hand in dismissal.  “Nay, don’t worry, he’ll treat you fine; no doubt you’ll be an asset for him.”  The comment troubled her, she couldn’t say why; but as she lay tossing in her bed that night, she couldn’t help but worry that she had somehow gotten in way over her head.    
   
*****  
  
Aedion stepped out of the tub and briskly toweled himself off, pulling on a pair of loose pants.  This was the first inn they had stayed at with private bathing rooms, and he had taken full advantage of the luxury to wash four days of road dirt off himself.  The preceding couple days had gone much as the first; they rode steadily all day, then stopped at the first inn they came across once night fell.  He and Raedan had shared a room the second night as well, but the third night and this one there were enough vacancies for them each to have their own.    
  
The others had taken to pointing out women for Aedion to invite to bed.  In truth, he drew more attention from the strangers they met, both at the inns and on the road, than either of the others.  He figured it was more because of his freakish size, which stood out even more now that he wasn’t mostly around other soldiers, than because any of the gawkers had any actual interest.  No, it was Litton who had found someone to share his bed each night.  Aedion couldn’t figure out how he did it; how he could walk over to a woman he had never met, strike up a conversation, and in a minute or twenty be leading her to his room.  Certainly Litton was handsome enough, and he wore the lieutenant’s uniform with much greater swagger than Aedion could pull off.  But he still needed to make the approach, find the words to capture a woman’s interest.  Even subtle eavesdropping didn’t help, as the conversations seemed so…ordinary.  Tonight he had come upstairs to bathe while Litton was still sizing up the selection, not really feeling like watching the master at work yet again.  
  
There came a quiet knock on the door and he called out, “Come in!”  He wondered what Raedan or Litton had forgotten as he began rubbing the water out of his hair.  The lock on the door clicked home at the same time as an unfamiliar scent hit him, and he snarled softly.  Like a fool, he’d left his weapons in the main room.  Dropping the towel, he peered through the cracked door into the room.  
  
The woman standing there, looking a little lost, was familiar.  She had been down at the tavern, and he had caught her eyeing him with more interest than awe.  Interest he returned, if he was being honest with himself; she was no more than twenty, with generous curves, fair skin, and long, curling black hair.  He stepped into the room and stopped.  “Hello,” he said warily.  
  
Her gray eyes traveled briefly over his bare torso and he cursed himself for forgetting his shirt as well.  “I, um,” she started hoarsely, then cleared her throat and continued, “I was waiting for you to come over all night.  I hope you don’t mind…”  
  
“What do you want?” he asked gently, a little perplexed.    
  
She squared her shoulders and lifted her chin.  “I wanted to kiss you,” she said, looking a little scared at her brazenness.  His feet carried him a few steps closer and he looked down at her mutely, unsure of what to say.  He wanted to kiss her too; wanted to do more than that, but he had no clue how to begin.  She was tall, nearly to his shoulder, and when she tilted her head up to look at him he had only to bend a little bit to brush her lips gently with his.  They were soft and warm, and tasted faintly of cider.  He pulled away to gauge her reaction, and she reached up and gripped his face and pulled him back to her.  She pressed her mouth more firmly against his, and he let her lips’ movements guide his own.  When she ran her tongue lightly along the seam of his mouth, he couldn’t stifle his moan as fire shot through him.  He opened for her and her tongue swept in, playing with his.    
  
His body reacted immediately and he shifted his hips a little away, not wanting to scare her.  She moved with him, stepped in closer, until he felt her hip brush against his throbbing cock.  He broke off the kiss then, a flush rising in his cheeks as he stepped back.  Her scent had shifted subtly, warmed and ripened, and he ached to gather her in his arms and press himself into her.  Those gray eyes were burning now as she looked at him.  “Why’d you stop?” she asked.  
  
“Umm,” he said, not sure what to say, “because I’m afraid if we keep going, I won’t be able to.  Stop,” he clarified, feeling like an idiot.  
  
“Well,” she said, a slow smile spreading on her full lips, “that’s okay with me.”  She stepped in and kissed him again, fingers working their way into his hair, his own hands moving to cup her jaw and brush the back of her neck.  After a few seconds - or hours - he remembered what else he needed to tell her and broke away again.  
  
“It’s just also, I, uh, I’ve never done this before.”  He knew he was blushing from his collarbones to his hair but it seemed very important she know.  
  
She arched an eyebrow.  “You’ve never made love to a stranger in an inn before?” she asked coyly.  
  
“Actually,” he replied with a small cough, “it’s a little more basic than that.”  
  
“I don’t…” Realization hit her and her jaw dropped.  “Wait, that’s not…possible.”  He laughed, because there was no other way to respond.  Her look became speculative.  “Is it because of a lack of inclination?”  
  
“Hardly,” he said drily, and laughed again as her gaze flicked down to what the thin pants were doing nothing to hide.  “More a lack of opportunity.”  
  
“That’s definitely not possible,” she said, gesturing at him and then flushing fiercely herself.  He supposed he should be flattered at her disbelief.    
  
“I assure you, it’s true.  I’ve been in war camps for the last couple years.”    
  
She snorted.  “Obviously, you’re an officer.”  He had forgotten that the insignia on his tunic would have told everyone in the tavern what he was.  “But half the men who come through town are officers, and that’s never stopped them.”  
  
“I’m also sixteen.”    
  
The girl looked as though the floor had dropped out from under her.  “You’re sixteen.”  He nodded.  “And an officer.”  He nodded again.  “And a…” her voice trailed off and he nodded a third time.  “I need to sit down.”  She nearly collapsed on the edge of the bed, and he stood there, utterly unsure of what to do, feeling like he had too many arms and legs.  “You don’t look sixteen,” she muttered, and he stifled a grin.  
  
Sitting on the bed next to her, he waited for her to say something more.  Finally she turned to him and gently brushed her thumb over his lower lip, those stunning eyes tracking the movement.  She followed that with her mouth and he responded, wrapping his arms around her, marveling in how much smaller than him she was, how fine-boned.  Her fingertips brushed his bare back and he flinched away as if she had whipped him, cursing himself for the involuntary reaction.  He kept his eyes averted as she pulled away to study him.  He had been able to smother the retch the feel of someone else’s hands on his back felt, but couldn’t quite control the fine tremors that wracked him.  
  
“You’re really nervous, aren’t you,” she said gently.  He nodded, trying to stifle the shame that was swamping him, hoping she truly believed it was mere first-time nerves that he was suffering from.  She stood up and faced him, then began to slowly undo the laces holding her dress.  The cloth slipped to the floor leaving her in just her sheer cotton shift.  “Here, now we’re about even,” she said, and stepped between his knees.  He could see every inch of her beneath the cloth, her nipples peaked against the chill, the soft curves of her abdomen and hips.  His knees were brushing against the sides of her legs and the heat that shot through him at the contact burned away the trembling.  He reached up and pulled her back down to his mouth.  
  
Somehow they ended up stretched out on the bed, legs and tongues entwined, and this time when her hands ran down his body he remained lost in his fog of lust.  She traced the muscles of his chest, of his abdomen, slipping a finger just below his waistband.  He sucked in a breath and she chuckled against his lips.  His own hands were roaming too, sliding over her rear, her breasts, grabbing her thigh to hitch her leg over his.  He wanted to feel her with his lips, not just his hands; to taste her sweet-smelling skin; to see what her nipples felt like rolling under his tongue.    
  
Pulling away from her lips, he moved his mouth to her jaw, then down her throat.  At her collarbone he met fabric and growled in frustration.  She sat up and pulled her shift over her head, and he growled again, this time in approval.  His mouth resumed its explorations, while his hand began making lazy circles up the insides of her thighs.  The blood was pounding in his ears as he neared the apex, and she spread herself wider, writhing against the brush of his callused fingers against her skin.  He stopped shy of his goal, uncertain how to proceed and afraid to hurt her; he settled for tracing along the crease of her thigh until she gently took his hand in her much smaller one and guided it to where she wanted it.  The first dip of his finger into her slick heat nearly undid him; her moan and the shift of her hips that drove that finger deeper into her had him gritting his teeth hoping desperately for control.    
  
She used her free hand to pull his mouth back up to hers, and then slipped that hand under his pants to grip him.  His muscles nearly went slack, utterly overwhelmed by sensation - the taste of her tongue, the scent of her, the feel of her warmth clutching his finger, of her small hand tugging on him.  He pulled back for a second and she took the opportunity to ease his pants over his hips, freeing his cock. Her teeth set in her lip at the sight of him, and that alone nearly made him climax. Kicking the pants to the floor, he allowed her to pull him on top of her, settling his knees between hers and his weight on his elbows.  She leaned up to kiss him again, then gently guided the tip of him into her.    
  
It was like nothing he could have imagined, the silky warmth enveloping the head of his cock causing every rational thought to flee.  On sheer instinct he rolled his hips, driving himself into her.  She gasped as he filled her and he froze.  Shit shit shit - horrified that he’d hurt her, he started to pull back but she wrapped her arms around him to stop him.  “Just…wait,” she whispered.  “Give me a minute.”  He remained unmoving, barely breathing, as he felt her ease and loosen around his cock.  As she relaxed, she took his face in her hands and brought his mouth back to hers, making lazy slow strokes of her tongue.  He began to mimic her movements with his body, and he thought he would die from the exquisite torture of it.  Each gentle rock of his hips ratcheted up the sensation, and when she moaned into his mouth… She seemed to feel the change in him and began moving her hips with his, quickening the tempo, widening her thighs to take him further in.  He was dimly aware of the groaning of the bed, the hitching of her breath, of the slender hand she had slipped between their bodies, but it all faded into background noise as his focus narrowed to where the two of them joined. When he couldn’t hold back any longer he gave a few deeper strokes, and when his release took him he spasmed hard against her; she cried out and he felt her core gripping his cock, further drawing him out.  
  
He nearly collapsed on her, rolling a little to the side to keep from crushing her, barely able to remember his own name as his breathing slowed.  He pressed his forehead against the pillow.  Holy gods.  No wonder wars had been fought over this privilege.  Her fingers brushed his sweaty hair back, and he turned to look at her flushed face and heavy-lidded eyes.  She glanced down to where they were still joined and he pulled out, gasping slightly at the pull on the sensitive tissue.  “Sorry,” he murmured.  “I’m sorry.”  
  
“What are you apologizing for?”  Her confusion caused a tiny wrinkle to form between her eyes, and he wanted to kiss it.    
  
“I don’t even know,” he said, “I just…Was that all right?  Are you okay?”  
  
She smiled and blinked, a little sleepily.  “You’re sweet.  I’m fine, that was more than fine.  That was lovely.”  She leaned over and kissed him thoroughly, then rose with a groan and headed to the bathing room, picking up her shift on the way.  He slumped down, every muscle in his body loose, and closed his eyes.  
  
He must have fallen asleep, because the next thing he knew he was tied down again, unable to move.  His breathing ratcheted up, and he thrashed against the restraints.  Not again, he thought, this will not happen again.  A hand traced over his ass and up his back, and with a roar he broke free and whipped around to his assailant -  
  
The girl was cringing next to him in bed, frozen in terror.  He stared at her, unable to rationalize her presence for a moment, still feeling the burn of invisible ropes on his wrists and ankles.  The bed was a tangled mess of sheets and he was drenched with sweat.  Breathe, he thought, breathe, I’m free, I’m free, I’m free.    
  
He rubbed a hand over his face and shuddered.  “I’m sorry,” he said hoarsely, feeling vaguely that he’d already said that.  “Nightmare.”  
  
She heaved a sigh of relief and gave him a half-smile.  “That’s okay, you’ve not shared a bed before.  It can take some getting used to.”  
  
He nodded and smiled as reassuringly as he could before climbing awkwardly over her to head to the bathing room.  Locking the door behind him, he staggered to the toilet and was violently sick.  Tears streamed down his face as he emptied his stomach, then slumped back against the wall, pulling his knees to his chest.  The buzzing that had slowly dissipated over the previous weeks rose again in his ears, and he could feel the blackness threatening to crash over him.  He tried to breathe, but he ended up just choking on a sob.  Letting his forehead drop to his knees, he gave up the struggle and let himself weep.    
  
Eventually the flood stopped and he sat there for a long time counting his inhales and exhales.  He just felt empty, hollow; a strong wind would have blown him away, but the crushing blackness was gone.  Heaving himself to his feet, he washed his face and then returned to the main room.  He was dully surprised to find the room dark save for the starlight shining through the window.  The girl was asleep on his bed; somehow he had expected her to disappear after his explosion.  Her face was slack, lips slightly parted, black hair in a long tangle over her shoulder; she looked so peaceful in her sleep that he hated to disturb her.  It appeared his options were to sleep on the floor or try to worm his way around or over her to claim the other half of the bed.  In the end, his bone-deep fatigue decided him, and he somehow managed to crawl from the foot of the bed up next to her.  She seemed to sense him in her sleep and moved closer, pressing herself against him.  Cautiously he wrapped one arm around her, holding her to his chest, slowly relaxing into her warmth.  His last conscious thought was that her hair smelled like night-blooming flowers.  
  
In the gray hour before dawn, he woke to find the girl watching him.  Blinking, he rubbed a broad hand over his face and one corner of his lips lifted into a lopsided smile.  “Morning,” he said, voice rough with sleep.  She reached up cautiously to rub her thumb over his cheek, her fingers easing into the margin of his hair.  He leaned into the touch, nearly purring.    
  
“When do you leave?” she whispered.  
  
“After breakfast.”  It hit him then, that he would never see her again.  That he didn’t even know her name.  Before he could ask, she pulled herself up onto her elbow and kissed him.  As the pink light of sunrise slowly stained the sky, they teased each other with their hands, their lips, their tongues.  He thought he was prepared for how it would feel to ease himself into her again, but he was wrong; she still utterly overwhelmed him.  When finally he rose and headed into the bathing room, he was planning to write to her.  By the time he finished buckling on his weapons, he was beginning to sketch a future with her in his mind.  But when he re-entered the main room, it was empty, the only sign she had ever been there the tangled sheets and lingering scent.  


	8. Chapter 8

“Gods, you look like shit,” Raedan said as Aedion slipped into a chair in the tavern.  
  
“Thanks, brother,” he said drily, as a server appeared with a plate laden with eggs, toast, sausage and mushrooms.    
  
Litton looked up from his own plate and sniggered.  “I don’t know, Raedan,” he said with a sly grin.  “To me he just looks like he got rode hard and put up wet.”    
  
Aedion pointed his fork at his fellow lieutenant.  “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he replied innocently, though his mouth twitched into an involuntary smile.  
  
“Come on, Ashryver, that girl was beautiful.”  She had been.  Beautiful and sweet and glorious under his hands.  
  
Raedan was watching the two of them like a cat torn between two mice.  “What girl?”  
  
It hit Aedion then - how did Litton know what the girl looked like?  “Right, what girl?  I left alone.”  
  
Litton nodded, his smile turning wicked.  “So you did.  But you see, here I was last night, talking to a lovely young woman, and what do you know?  She kept asking me if I knew you, if I’d be able to introduce her to you.  I told her I thought you’d be happy if she introduced herself, and gave her your room number.  When she didn’t come back…”  
  
Raedan punched him in the arm.  “So that’s why you’re a bit late!  Good for you!  It’s about time.”  
  
“No, I’m late because I’m the only one who ever feeds the damn horses.”  The others laughed.  “Which reminds me, it looks like rain.  We better get moving if we want to get anywhere today.”  
  
“And what do you mean it’s about time, Raedan?” Litton asked, forehead puckered.  “Wasn’t he fucking your sister?”  
  
Raedan rolled his eyes.  “Of course not.  Why does everybody always think that?”  Aedion laughed, shaking his head at the pair of them.  
  
It rained off and on all morning, getting steadily worse as they rode into the afternoon.  When they finally reached a village with a small inn, they were soaking and miserable.  They hustled the horses into the stable, and Raedan’s teeth were chattering audibly while they quickly stripped the tack off the horses and began rubbing them down.  As they finished and Aedion threw the animals armloads of hay, he turned to find Litton rummaging in the saddle bags.  He pulled out a small bottle and tossed it to Aedion, who caught it automatically.  “What’s this?”    
  
Litton shrugged.  “I figured if you’re going to start enjoying yourself, you should probably be taking that.  Unless you want to sire children all over Adarlan.”  
  
Aedion’s jaw dropped, and he turned in the direction they had ridden from.  “Shit!  Oh, shit.  I never even thought…What do I do?  Should I go back?”  
  
The other two laughed.  “What do you mean?”  Litton asked.  “No doubt she’s taking something.  Even if she wasn’t, if she started today it’ll be fine.”  Aedion followed them into the inn, still fretting about the contraceptive tonic that now felt so heavy in his pocket.  He didn’t want to leave that lovely woman as his mother had been left, alone to raise an unwanted child.  He didn’t want to be like whoever his father was, unaware or uncaring that his son walked the earth at all.  The second he was alone in the tiny room the innkeeper showed him, he gulped down a dose of the foul-tasting liquid.  
  
The tavern directly below his room was packed with locals and travelers alike.  He threaded his way through the crush of people until he saw the others.  Litton had somehow found them not just a table, but four women with whom to share it.  The women were all giggling at something Raedan had said, and both men had broad grins no doubt caused by the female hands on their thighs.  Aedion hesitated just a second before joining them.  He was welcomed enthusiastically by the women after Litton’s brief introduction, and soon found himself joining into the flow of the banter.  At first it was easy to grin and joke, but after an hour he found it all grating.  The women all seemed to gush too much over his accent, his eyes, the size of his hands.  They touched him - touched all three of them - with too much of a proprietary air.  Yet when they split up for the night, he didn’t object when the slim brown-eyed girl followed him; he didn’t hesitate to respond when she pulled him down into a kiss, didn’t even pause as their clothes hit the floor and they found themselves tangled together on the bed.  Nor did he stop her when she gathered her clothing and slipped out of the room once their panting had slowed.  No, he relished the freedom of having the bed to himself, and drifted off thinking Delaney’s sharp wit, Avis’ sweet smile, Maida’s bubbling laughter.  Of the unknown woman’s gray eyes hooded with passion, her skin silky beneath his lips.  
  
*****  
   
When Delaney appeared at Clery’s house the next morning for her day’s assignment, she was shown into a small empty parlor to wait.  She could hear raised voices, the words indistinct, from somewhere above her.  There was a small crash, as if a door had been flung open and hit the wall, and then a thin, wiry gray-haired man, face hard and sharp as a blade, passed the parlor door.    
  
“Weylan,” came Clery’s voice from the region of the stairs, “stop.  Please.  Surely you can see -”  
  
“See what?” The other man’s voice was cold and dry as a winter wind.  Delaney shivered, despite the warmth of the room.  “See that you’re going to waste more resources, more lives, trying to rally a force that has scattered to the four winds?  One that has no hope of overcoming Adarlan’s might?”  
  
“You don’t know that.”  
  
A quiet snort sounded.  “Yes, Clery, I do.  They killed the greatest king since Brannon himself, then his heir and the princess of the wildfire.  They slaughtered my forces as if they were chattel.  When we have no one left to rule, it is the lords’ responsibility to protect the people.  Our people are dying, Clery; dying from the sanctions and the taxes that bastard King has levied on us.  I will not send more to their death on a fool’s hope.”  
  
Clery walked into sight of Delaney’s unintentional hiding spot then, his fists clenched, veins popping on his neck.  “So you mean to just give up, then?”  
  
“Give up?  I mean to survive, and help our people do the same.  You would do well to heed that right now, those are our choices.  Survive, or die.”  The door creaked open, then closed with a firm click.  Clery stood silently in the hall, the only sounds the crackling of the parlor fire and his heavy breathing.  Delaney must have shifted then, as suddenly he turned to her, a calm mask falling over his face.  
  
“Give me a moment, Layne,” he said.  “I’m running a bit late this morning.”    
  
Delaney sat on the couch, idly perusing the titles of the books on the small adjacent table, as the minutes ticked by.  When she heard footsteps nearly running down the steps, she leaped to her feet and met Clery in the doorway.  He handed her three letters, their addresses so hastily written as to be barely legible.  “Please deliver these, quick as you can.  When you get back, I’ll have more.”  
  
Glancing at the addresses and her map, she was pleased to see that she had been to all three before, and relieved that none required Horse, given that she had left him stuffing his face full of hay in the Three Pigs’ stables.  Her years of practicing negotiating crowded spaces unnoticed proved helpful, and she slipped through the streets at a jog.  In under ten minutes she was gasping for breath in the foyer of the first address, one of the large ornate homes that she found a bit intimidating.  She had barely recovered enough to plan her path to the next place when the master of the house appeared himself and pressed his reply into her hand and she was off again.  The next home was a similar experience, though the house was small and run down and she could hear the letter’s recipient cursing under his breath.  Finally, she half-ran to the third.  The lawyer’s office had a client, who the lawyer unceremoniously sent out with a promise of contact later in the day, upon receipt of the letter.  The man then ensconced himself in a back room with his assistant.  There was low muttering behind the door for several minutes, then an excited voice exclaimed, “Then Darrow can go to Hellas’ fiery realm!”  There was a hushing sound, and the man continued more quietly but still intelligible.  “That bastard lost his spine when Orlon died, and now he’s just bending over for the King.  He won’t even try to raise the Bane?  Then we’ll do it without him.”    
  
Delaney’s ears had pricked up at Darrow’s name; she had barely heard anything after that.  Was it possible that bitter man from this morning was the man she sought?  She shuddered at the thought of delivering her message to him.  Yet Aedion had bade her to find him, and she would do so if it took her last breath.  The lawyer’s assistant burst out of the back room and jabbed the letter at her, and she tucked it in her cloak and ran.  
  
Clery seemed surprised by her reappearance, and after checking that the seals were intact complimented her on her efficiency.  He presented her with a stack of perhaps a dozen letters and two silver coins, promising a third if she returned before the evening meal.  She did so with time to spare, even after pausing to gobble a meat pie from a stand she passed.  On return to Clery’s house, she accepted her coin and then paused, debating whether or not to ask about the man from the morning.  Clery noticed her hesitation.  
  
“Do you need something, Layne?”  
  
“No, sir,” she replied, “I just…I was wondering, sir, was that Lord Darrow this morning?”  
  
She realized her mistake when he slowly met her eyes for the first time.  “And what does a farm boy from Adarlan know about the lords of Terrasen?” he asked, too softly, ice in his voice.  
  
 “Nothing, sir, forgive me, sir,” she stammered, bowing.  Turning to leave, she was halted by a hard hand on her arm and the smooth rasp of a knife being drawn.  She froze.  
  
 “You know, boy,” Clery said in an oddly pleasant tone, “I’m a clever man.  But even clever men can make mistakes.”  He paused, seeming to be expecting a response, so she made an indistinct noise in her throat.  “I can’t help but wonder, if I were the King of Adarlan, and I wanted to learn about rebel movements in a conquered realm, would I send in soldiers?  Or would I send in a scrawny farm boy on a decrepit old horse, make him pretend to be looking for work?  I think I’d do the latter, don’t you?”  
  
Delaney wasn’t sure how to respond, so blurted out the truth.  “Perhaps, but I doubt that he would send a young woman who may have a price on her head.”  
  
Clery clearly had not expected that response.  “Pardon me?” he said flatly.    
  
She straightened up slowly and turned to meet his eye.  “My name is Delaney,” she said in her normal voice.  “Not Layne.  I came to Orynth to deliver a message to Lord Darrow, one that I realized today may help your cause.”  
  
“A message from whom.”  There was no inflection in his tone.  
  
“From a son of Terrasen.”  
  
“A son of Terrasen.  Living in Adarlan.”  She nodded.  ‘Who is this man?  What was the message?”  
  
Delaney shook her head.  “I shall tell no one but Lord Darrow.”  
  
Suddenly the knife was pressed against her throat.  “I could kill you now,” he said in her ear.  
  
“Then the message shall go unheard.”  She couldn’t hide her trembling, but she would not betray Aedion, no matter if her life hung in the balance.  
  
They stood like that for a long moment, before he slowly pulled the knife away.  “I shall consider.  Go back to the inn.  If you try to leave the city, I shall know.  Come here tomorrow and I will have my answer.”  
  
Delaney fled.  
  
  
 *****  
  
The week continued much as it had been.  Every day they dealt with intermittent rain, never heavy enough to shorten their day’s travel but enough to try their tempers.  Every night, women more or less queued up to share their beds.  Aedion soon found himself growing bored.  His cock had decided it quite liked being used for its real purpose, but his mind increasingly held the women in contempt even while his body reveled in their soft curves.  He hated the way they stared at him as if he were some sort of novelty, a menagerie animal to gawk at and take pleasure in.  He hated himself for being so eager to oblige them, but he found increasingly he couldn’t sleep unless he’d exhausted himself with one of them.  
  
A day’s ride from Paget’s camp, the wind rose and with it what had been a light drizzle turned into torrents.  When it shifted into sleet and the footing got slick, they stopped earlier than normal, having the good fortune of coming to a large market town.  After settling in the horses and getting their rooms at one of the inns, Aedion set out to explore the town. Hood up over his head to protect himself from the frigid precipitation, he prowled the streets, soon ready to start snarling at the way people gave him a wide berth.  
  
Finding a small bookseller, he entered, shaking back his hood and with it some of his temper.  He perused the selection, finding a couple of interest.  As he paid for his books and left the shop, he felt someone’s eyes on him, and glanced around.  A man leaned against a brick wall across the street, watching him from under the hood of his fine green cloak.  With a growl under his breath, Aedion tucked his purchase into his pocket and headed back to the inn.  
  
The evening seemed destined to pass much as they all had.  He was sitting with Raedan, waiting for Litton to appear with some ale, then for the hunt to begin.  Whether he was the hunter or the hunted remained up for some debate in his mind.  Suddenly Raedan paused in his chatter.  “Do you know that man?”  
  
Aedion looked in the direction Raedan indicated, to see the man from town, still watching him with cool interest, still leaning against a wall though a considerably warmer and drier one.  His cloak was off, revealing black hair, eyes the color of fine brandy, and an aristocratic face.  “No; why would I?”  
  
Raedan shrugged.  “Well we’re not that far from Terrasen, I wasn’t sure.  Why do you think he’s staring at you?”  
  
Looking back at the man, Aedion raised an eyebrow, receiving a slow smile in response.  “Probably for the same reason as everyone else,” he replied, turning to his companion with a grin.    
  
Raedan gave a snort and muttered under his breath something that sounded like, “Boy, get you laid a few times…”  Litton returned then, and they soon had both their dinners and designated trysts for the evening.  Aedion dragged his attention to the chirping woman now gripping his elbow, rewarding her inane conversation with a few smiles and laughs.  He followed willingly enough as she guided him to her room, and his body got into the spirit of the evening as soon as his hands were touching bare flesh.  But it was his gray-eyed beauty he pictured as he kissed and teased, and it was she who moaned beneath him as he moved deep within her.  
  
A couple of hours later he was back at the bar for another glass of ale, trying to drown his unabated restlessness before heading to his own quarters.  Someone took the stool next to him, and a warm, throaty voice asked, “So did you have a pleasant evening?”  He turned to see the amber-eyed man from before signaling to the barmaid for a glass of some sort of clear liquor.    
  
“Pleasant enough,” Aedion replied cautiously.  
  
“And how was your choice of companion?”  There was a touch of laughter in that beautiful voice.  
  
Aedion’s lips twitched a bit.  “She was…satisfactory.”  
  
“Oh, dear.”  The man laughed out loud at that.  “Are you so experienced with women that you can manage to rate them?”  
  
Now Aedion was grinning.  “I’m getting there more rapidly than you might expect.”  
  
“Well, I would imagine she would rate you a bit higher than satisfactory, if only because your companions have long returned to their own rooms.”  He gestured behind him.  “I’ve been sitting here bored out of my skull all evening, with nothing better to do than watch all you fools and take notice of comings…,” he cocked an eyebrow with a sly smile, “…and goings.”  Finishing his drink, he tossed a coin on the counter and rose, stretching.  He was nearly as tall as Aedion, though much narrower in his frame.  He held out his hand.  “Mikkal.”  
  
“Aedion.” They shook, Aedion noting that the stranger’s calluses matched his own.  A soldier then, most likely.  Mikkal gave a courteous nod and left, and Aedion turned back to the bar.  Draining his own glass, he too paid and then headed towards his room.  When he reached the staircase, Mikkal was there waiting.  Aedion’s breath caught, his heart ratcheting up, though he didn’t quite know why.  
  
“You know,” Mikkal said, stepping in close, “I’ve been thinking.  You shouldn’t have to end the evening with just satisfactory.”  He stretched up and pressed his mouth to Aedion’s.    
  
Though the man’s lips were soft, the kiss was anything but.  No, there was command in this, and Aedion responded, a long-banked fire flaring through his veins.  Reaching up, he cupped Mikkal’s jaw, marveling at the rough-soft feel of his stubble, such a contrast to the smooth tongue in his mouth.  The other man’s fingers were tangling in his shaggy hair, and Aedion reveled in the hard muscle pressing against his body, nothing like the soft curves he had been exploring of late.  His hands slipped down to grip the back of Mikkal’s arms, tugging him even closer.  He didn’t know how long they stood there in the shadows, but eventually Mikkal pulled back slightly, breaking the kiss.  Aedion didn’t let him go far, resting his forehead against the shorter man’s, eyes closed as he regained control over himself.  After a minute - or an hour - Mikkal gently broke his grip and turned away.  
  
“See you around, lieutenant,” he said over his shoulder, and disappeared up the stairs.  Aedion stood there for a long moment, head leaned back against the wall, before staggering up to his own room drunk not on ale but on the stranger.  
  
*****  
  
Delaney was at Clery’s while he was still sitting at breakfast the next morning.  He laughed a little grimly when she was shown into his breakfast room.  Setting down his fork and knife, he leaned back and surveyed her.  She hadn’t bound her breasts that morning, though she still dressed as a boy; she wanted to give as much proof of her claim as possible.    
  
“Well,” he said, eyes fixing on the swell of her chest, “looks like part of your claim is true at least.  Why have you been dressing as a boy?”  
  
She shrugged while she considered what was safe to tell him.  “It was the suggestion of someone I met along the way.  There may be people who are looking for me.”  She hesitated, then added, “I had dyed my hair as well until I reached the city.”    
  
“You’ll confess this to me, yet you won’t tell me who sent you, or why you are so determined to deliver your message only to Lord Darrow.”  Her silence was response enough.  “Well, Delaney,” and there was venom in the way he said her name, “I suppose I shall see if Darrow is willing to meet with you, and under what conditions. I will send for you once I have his answer.”  
  
“Thank you, sir,” she said and left.  On her return to the inn, she sought out the innkeeper and laid out a version of her story.  The woman was sympathetic to her plight of needing to escape from a violent husband, and thought she was clever to disguise herself as a boy and make it all the way to Terrasen, where surely the evil husband would never think to look for her.  She promptly gave Delaney a job in the laundry for as long as she would need it, allowing her to remain there for free in exchange.  At least this way she could stay and if Clery decided not to help she could try to track down Lord Darrow herself.  She sighed as she helped gather the sheets from the guest rooms and heat the water for washing.  It always came back to laundry for her.  
  
*****  
  
They reached Paget’s camp mid-afternoon the next day.  It was set up not too differently from Perrington’s, and they were met as soon as they reached the square by an officer who identified himself as Captain Gall.  He showed them to the stables, where they handed off the horses to the stable hands.  Aedion was reluctant to turn Avenar over, and did so only with a rub to her forehead and a promise to visit later and make sure she was comfortable.  The stable boy gave him a bow and assured him he would take special care of her, and Aedion thanked him with a squeeze of the shoulder.  
  
Following a quick tour of the main buildings, Gall showed them to their assigned quarters.  Litton and Aedion would be sharing a small, neat house with two other officers, who were absent at the moment; Raedan as left in the barracks with the other recruits.  The captain waited while they set down their possessions, then ordered them to follow him as he headed to the main house.  They were shown into a large study with an enormous desk.  A tall man with dark hair silvered at the temples looked up from his work and surveyed them.  
  
“General Paget, sir, this is Lieutenant Litton and Lieutenant Ashryver, newly arrived from General Perrington.”  They both bowed.  
  
The man rose and stalked around the desk, his eyes fixed on Aedion.  “Well, well, well, boy, I can’t believe it.  When I saw your name on the lists I nearly shit myself.”  He snorted.  “And you’ve managed to get taller and scrawnier, which I didn’t think was possible.”  
  
“Sir?”  
  
“You don’t remember me, do you.”  It wasn’t a question, so Aedion didn’t reply.  “And here I would have thought that nearly breaking your jaw would’ve made more of an impression on you.”  
  
A memory of a rainy dawn flashed in his mind, of a beloved man dropping with an arrow to the throat, of a fervent wish to follow him.  He put on his wildest grin.  “I think the force of the blow knocked the memory right out of me, sir.”  
  
The general laughed, surprising both Aedion and Litton.  “With that smart mouth I’m surprised nobody has slit your throat.  You owe Lord Breiner your life, by the way.  He’s the only reason you didn’t hang that day.”  
  
“I shall give him my thanks should I see him again, sir.  Though you may believe you owe him a debt of a different sort once you’re done dealing with me.”  
  
Paget laughed again.  “Well, son, you’re good for amusement if nothing else.”  He leaned against the desk, arms folded in front of him.  “You’re a few days early, which is appreciated.  Your main trainers won’t be here until the end of the week.  In the meantime, you will be expected to join in with the rest of the lieutenants for workouts and meals.  If you have any questions, Major Gall will address them.”    
  
“Thank you, sir,” they both murmured, then Aedion reached into his pocket and handed him the letter Major Farrers had given him with a bow.  They were dismissed, and as soon as they were out of the building and away from Gall Litton elbowed him hard in the ribs.  
  
“What the hell were you thinking back there?” he hissed.  “You can’t talk to a general that way.”  
  
Aedion cocked his head at his friend.  “Evidently I can,” he said, one corner of his mouth lifting.  
  
“And why didn’t you tell me you knew the general?”  
  
“I didn’t remember him.  Honestly,” he protested when Litton glared at him in disbelief.  “I met him once for just a moment when I had just been taken prisoner.”  
  
“But he broke your jaw?”  
  
“Not quite, though not for lack of trying.”  Aedion rubbed the area thoughtfully, remembering their brief interaction.  “He knocked me off my feet though.”  
  
Litton was shaking his head in disbelief.  “And why did he punch you in the face?  I mean, I can think of a dozen different reasons why anyone would want to, but what was it specifically.”  
  
“I wouldn’t tell him my name.”  
  
“You wouldn’t…Why the hell not?”  
  
Aedion’s temper flared.  “Look, I’d lost my entire family.  I’d just watched my friends die trying to get me to safety.  They’d dragged me behind a horse twenty miles in the rain, and I had no idea why they hadn’t just put an arrow through my throat too.  I figured it was only a matter of time before I hanged, might as well make it sooner than later.”  
  
Litton snorted, then started to laugh in earnest.  Aedion just stared at him in confusion.  “Well,” he said, when he was able to catch his breath, “I guess it’s ended up being later, huh?”  
  
*****  
  
It was after dark before Mikkal reached the gates.  He greeted the unfamiliar sentinel, and was passed through with a bow.  If his status didn’t earn him respect, his last name always did.  It was the reason he had left this camp six years earlier; he didn’t want everyone falling over themselves because of his name.  He wanted to earn his own promotions, and between the battles in Terrasen and now his service in Fenharrow he had finally done so.  
  
It had not been his idea to return here, even if he hated the outpost near Bellhaven.  But much of his advancement stemmed from his work with younger officers, and this round of officer training was being done here, so here he had been sent.  He had planned on spending more time in town as he wasn’t due in for a few more days, but town had bored him.  That golden-haired lieutenant had not.  
  
Leaving his horse in the stables, he went straight to the main house.  The housekeeper greeted him effusively.  “Is the general in his study?” he asked, kissing her on the cheek.  
  
“No, sir, he and your mother are at dinner.  They weren’t expecting you till the end of the week, they’ll be thrilled you’re home.”  Dropping his bags in the foyer, he took a deep breath and headed into the dining room.  
  
Mrs. Giffard wasn’t wrong; on his appearance, his mother burst into tears and his father rose and embraced him.  They ushered him into a chair and his mother fussed at one of the servants to get him a plate and some wine.  His father leaned back and surveyed him with satisfaction.  
  
“I can’t tell you, son, how happy I am to have you home.  Or should I call you Captain Paget now?”  He chuckled and Mikkal smiled politely.  “You’re early, only about half your class are here yet so you can have a few days to spend some time with your mother.”  His mother gushed and he murmured some words of agreement.  The conversation was initially a little stilted, partly because his mother kept crying, but soon smoothed into a wide-ranging discourse on books, music, and the differences between Fenharrow and Adarlan.  As the brandy was served, the general leaned back in his chair.    
  
“Since you’re here early, I’d like your input on one of your new officers.”  
  
“Oh?”  
  
His father nodded thoughtfully.  “Yes, I think we may have a bit of a problem with him.”  
  
“Already?  How did he get promoted if he’s a problem?”  
  
The general shook his head.  “Not that kind of a problem.  You should have a look at the report on him.”  
His mother glared at them both.  “He’s been here for all of an hour and you’re already putting him to work?”  His father looked sheepish, but Mikkal was intrigued.    
  
“It’s all right, Mother, I’d love to see what the situation is.”  
  
They took their leave of her and headed into the study.  The general lifted a large stack of papers, flipped through, and pulled one out.  As Mikkal was reaching for it, he found himself thinking, Not him.  Not the beautiful one.  
  
He flipped open the folder, and of course it was him.  _Prince Aedion Ashryver, originally of Wendlyn then Terrasen_.  Interesting.  The young man at the inn had shown none of the arrogance he would have expected of a prince, just what is natural to a freakishly large and attractive man.  _Age: sixteen_.  “Shit.” He said that out loud without meaning to.    
  
His father just nodded, assuming a different problem than that his son had seriously considered taking a sixteen year old lieutenant to bed.  “Keep reading.”    
  
Taken prisoner after killing several Adarlanian soldiers during the last battle in Terrasen, converted into a soldier for Adarlan.  Had been training other recruits since fourteen.  Sparring with older soldiers for the same time frame.  Excellent horseman.  Proficient with sword, dagger, throwing knives, bow, crossbow, and in hand to hand.  Flawless record for sentry duty.  Notes from Colonel Taber about excellence in strategic discussion.  He flipped the page to see the letter from Major Farrers, scanned it, and looked up at his father.  “He killed a man with one punch?”  
  
The general looked grave.  “Evidently.  You’ll note Farrers is careful to state that it was a fair fight, but that the boy is stronger and faster than anybody had realized.  Apparently he admitted he’d been pulling his punches since he was assimilated, but it sounds like the other man was insubordinate and he was trying to put him on the ground to prove a point.”  
  
Mikkal whistled.  “Well, he sure as hell did that.”  He thought back to what he had observed from Ashryver at the inn and around the town.  He hadn’t seemed overtly aggressive at any point; intimidating, perhaps, for ordinary citizens, but he’d been polite, amusing, unassuming.    
  
“One of your tasks will be to devise a way for him to work out without killing anybody.  We don’t want him in the habit of slowing himself down or weakening his blows, but we can’t risk our men either.”  
  
“I’ll think of something,” Mikkal says.  “This should be interesting.”  
  
His father grinned then, a playful expression few ever saw.  “I met him, you know.  Right after he’d been captured.  He was bruised and exhausted, and he was the most defiant creature I have ever seen in my life.  I wasn’t even sure he was human, the way he looked at me.”  He chuckled.  “I told Breiner he should kill him while he had the chance, but he was adamant the boy could be turned.”  
  
Mikkal mulled this over.  “You think Breiner was right?”  
  
“I hope so, son.  I hope so.”  
  
*****  
  
The evening passed in a flurry of meeting new people, with the usual posturing and half-joking verbal sparring that always seemed to occur when soldiers met.  The officers were encouraged to socialize, and there was even a small meeting room with a bar designed for that purpose.  Aedion and Litton backed each other up, telling stories of their travels in tandem.  As the hour started to grow late, Aedion tossed back one last drink and stood.  “I’m going to go check on my horse,” he announced when he noticed all the eyes turning to him.  
  
“Is that some sort of code?” one of the other men quipped.  
  
Aedion grinned, and Litton piped up.  “Nah, he’s just in love with his horse.”  There was laughter and a few whistles at that.  
  
“Come on, my friend, have you seen my horse?  She’s beautiful.”  Everyone laughed again as he made his escape.  Avenar was fine, of course.  The stable boy had been true to his word: her coat was gleaming, her tack polished, and she was knee-deep in straw.  She nickered at him, and he rubbed her white spot for a while until she got bored and turned back to her hay.  Litton’s and Raedan’s horses were fine too.  He needed sleep, but the mere thought of lying alone in the dark gave him the jitters, so he explored the camp for a while until he heard the other officers returning to their living quarters.  He and Litton were sharing with an experienced lieutenant and a captain, who had surveyed them both dispassionately and told them to make sure they cleaned up after themselves.  He lay awake for a long time, gazing out his window at the constellations so familiar to him.  He wondered where Delaney was, if she had found Darrow yet.  If Avis and Maida were safe.  If the gray-eyed woman had ever thought of him again after she had left without a good-bye.  Where Mikkal was, and whether he’d appear at this camp…  
  
The next morning, he was up early and spoiling for a workout.  His lack of sleep had not cured his restlessness; if anything it had made it worse.  Once he was out on the pitch, sword in his hand, he finally felt like he could take a real breath.  Aedion’s opponent was a major who was perhaps thirty, with a pleasant face and a no-nonsense manner of handling his weapons.  With the first clash of metal, Aedion found himself settled back in his body.  Major Ivry was an excellent fighter, the best he had faced since sparring with Rhoe’s men, and time was called before either disarmed the other.  It was the first time in over a year he hadn’t won a sword fight, and he couldn’t wipe the smile off his face as he bowed to the older man and received a bow in return.    
  
The midday meal was the only one officers shared with the regulars, and Aedion was pleased to be find Raedan sitting with a group of fellow trainees.  He slipped into the empty chair next to his friend, and was introduced around.  It was obvious Raedan went up several notches in the other boys’ estimation for being on a first name basis with the new Lieutenant Ashryver, but as Aedion joined in with the teasing and raunchy jokes they soon seemed to forget that he outranked them.  Until abruptly a familiar musky scent hit him, and the table around him hushed.  He looked around to see Mikkal standing behind him, a captain’s insignia on his tunic.  Standing, he inclined his head.  “Captain.”  
  
“Lieutenant.” Mikkal nodded once in return.  “If you would be so kind as to join me, there are a few things I’d like to discuss.”  With a quick smile to the trainees, Aedion followed him, trying to figure out if he was in some sort of trouble, or if this was merely an excuse to get him alone.  Both options seemed equally likely, though what he could have done wrong already was a mystery.  Mikkal led him out of the dining hall and down to the pitch, where he turned and examined him, arms crossed.    
  
“I was watching you this morning, and I read your file,” Mikkal finally said.    
  
“Sir?”  Aedion replied, now pretty certain he was more on the in-trouble end of things.    
  
“How long have you been holding back in your fighting?”  
  
Oh.  “Since I was about eleven, sir.”  
  
“Why?”  
  
“I broke another boy’s cheekbone, sir.”  He found he hated calling this man sir, when all he wanted to do was drag him into another stairwell.  Or a bedroom.  
  
“And with weapons?”  
  
“I only hold back with weapons if I’m helping train, sir.”  
  
“So this morning, that was your best fight?”  
  
“Well, sir, Major Ivry is a better swordsman than I’ve been up against in a while.  I didn’t hold back, but I don’t know that it was my best fight.”  
  
Mikkal nodded thoughtfully.  “I’m going to have some dummies made so you can work your punches full-strength on something you can’t kill.”  Aedion grimaced, but the captain didn’t seem to notice.  “I’ll still have you work hand-to-hand some with people, but we may do something a bit differently, we’ll have to see.”  He flashed a quick smile.  “I’m your new trainer, by the way.”  
  
*****  
  
Mikkal walked away before he could do something utterly stupid.  Following the session this morning, he had queried Ivry about Ashryver.  The major was the best swordsman they had, which was why they had been paired.  Ivry had shaken his head wryly.  “That boy took every ounce of skill I had, Paget.  And that’s with him being underweight and not yet fully grown.  He’s faster than he has any right to be.  Give him another thirty pounds of muscle and I’m not sure there’s any mortal alive who could stand against him.”  
  
After making Ashryver demonstrate his skill with the bow, knife fighting, and throwing knives, Mikkal had reached the conclusion that there was nobody in the camp who could teach him anything about fighting.  All they could do was build him up physically, and train him in strategy and managing people.  Though the boy was confident in his skill, he wasn’t cocky.  No, he was meticulous.  And with those restless turquoise eyes and those broad shoulders and hands…yes, Mikkal was smart to depart when he did.    
  
He spent the afternoon taking his mother into town to do some shopping and visiting.  Naturally she kept enquiring about whether he had any particular lady friends in Fenharrow, and scoffing when he replied in the negative.  It wasn’t that he hadn’t had women, it was simply that they bored him.  He wondered what she’d say if she knew he desperately wanted to bed a teenage lieutenant he was responsible for training.  As it was, she introduced him to several eligible young ladies in town, and he smiled prettily at them as they did at him but his mind was on his work.  Not just Ashryver, but he had to do right by the rest of them as well.   So he planned his program with half his brain, while playing the role of dutiful son and polite officer with the other.  
  
As he escorted his mother back to the camp, he saw Ashryver laughing in the square with several of the other young officers.  Their eyes met, and the boy gave him a brief flash of a cocky smile before turning back to the others.  I can’t, Mikkal lectured himself sternly, citing all the reasons why it was a bad idea.  Not that it was unusual for soldiers to share each other’s beds; but it was frowned upon for a superior officer to take an inferior one as a lover, especially if they were working closely together.  He made a vow that for the next three months, he would treat Ashryver solely as a promising young lieutenant and nothing more.  
  
*****  
  
Delaney waited five days for Clery to send word.  She passed the time when she wasn’t working exercising Horse and memorizing the city.  Finally, she received a message one evening that she was expected the next morning; Lord Darrow would meet with her at Clery’s with a small collection of other people.  She told the innkeeper and was given permission to take the day off from her laundry duties.  
  
Her palms were sweating by the time she was admitted into Clery’s house.  Though the layout was familiar to her, she somehow felt like a stranger.  She was shown into the parlor, and she curtsied before the cold-faced lord and his entourage.    
  
“Well, girl,” Darrow said waspishly, “I suppose you better tell us your story.  Who sent you?”  
  
Delaney straightened up, lifting her chin.  She would not be afraid.  “Aedion Ashryver, your lordship.”  
  
Clery made a choking noise behind her.  “Impossible!  Aedion Ashryver is dead.”  
  
The word clanged through her.  Her knees recognized the meaning before her brain did, and she collapsed to the floor as everything went dark.  
  
*****  
  
It could not have been long before she awoke to gentle hands lightly slapping her face.  Pain speared through her heart, and she swallowed hard against the sob building in her throat.  Aedion, oh, Aedion, brother of her heart.  She never should have left him to those bastards.  How much had he suffered…    
  
Clery’s concerned face swam into view, and she heard Darrow in the background say drily, “Still think she’s lying then?”  
  
Clery glared over his shoulder, then turned back to her.  “Delaney,” he said gently, but she couldn’t quite attend him.  “Delaney!”  More sharply.  She blinked, and her vision cleared.  “It seems I was wrong,” he said soothingly.  “Lord Darrow informs me that though we were all under the impression Ashryver was killed in the battle against Adarlan,” he directed a venomous glance at the lord, “he actually was taken prisoner.  Perhaps you can enlighten us on what happened since then?”  
  
“He’s…” Her voice was quavering, and she gritted her teeth for a moment to try to find some control.  “He’s still alive, then?”  
  
“Yes,” said Darrow, watching her narrowly.  “And according to the report I just received this week, he’s now a lieutenant for the King of Adarlan.”    
  
Delaney pressed the heels of her hands into her eyes and took a few deep shuddering breaths that turned into sobs.  Alive, he was alive and a lieutenant.  After a moment she regained her composure, and was helped shakily into a chair by a man she didn’t know.    
  
“Quite an interesting response, young lady,” Darrow said.  
  
“When I left…when I left he was in danger.  I wasn’t sure if those Adarlanian bastards had killed him.”  The men glanced at each other uneasily.    
  
“Are you not from Adarlan yourself?”    
  
Delaney shrugged indifferently.  “Technically.  I was raised in General Perrington’s war camp.  If that’s not a motivator for a woman to turn against her country, I don’t know what is.”  
  
She told them the whole story then, from hiding for years to avoid being taken by force, to the first time Aedion had stumbled over her when newly at Perrington’s camp.  The hanging of the Terrasen guard earned grim looks from among the assembled company.  She talked about how they had become friends, how he had basically adopted she and her siblings as family.  How he fought like an animal and nobody knew what to make of him, so they tossed him in with the experienced soldiers.  How everyone in camp seemed to love him, from the lowest stable boy to the highest officer, with the exception of the general.  She told them about the confrontation with Balam over the thrown knife, and she teared up again when she got to how she had found him tied up, bleeding and barely conscious that night.  Here she fudged a little bit, leaving out the details of the torture he had endured, that she had been unable to save him from.  Only Darrow seemed to notice she was withholding information; his lips pressed into a thin line, but he let it go.    
  
Finally, she reached the point when he had ordered her to leave, and she looked straight at Darrow.  “He told me to come here, to find you.  He wanted me to tell you he was alive, and that he was finding a way.”  
  
“Finding a way.  Is that the only message?”  
  
She pulled out the map that had been left in her pack, with its little fable on the back.  Hesitantly, she handed it to him.  He scanned it quickly, then read it again more slowly before giving it to Clery who did the same.  They exchanged a look.  ‘’Do you know what this means?” Clery asked her.  
  
“No,” she said, a little defiantly.    
  
“He gave it to you but didn’t explain it?”  
  
“It was in the pack.”  They both looked at her expectantly.  “He had hidden a pack for me, I didn’t know until the night he sent me away.  This was in the bottom.”  
  
“Why did he hide a pack for you?” Clery asked in bewilderment.  “Surely he couldn’t have known he’d be…caught.”  
  
She shook her head.  “I don’t know, I’ve been trying to figure that out for over a month.”  
  
Clery turned to Darrow.  “Surely now you see.  Surely now you agree.  We’ve got to rally the Bane.  Rally them, and get him out of Adarlan.  He’s the only surviving member of the royal family!  If we find him, he can rule!”  
  
“No.”  
  
“What?” Clery exploded out of his chair.  “You’re going to leave Prince Ashryver to those butchers?  He could be key to winning this fight!”  
  
“Did you not read this?” Darrow sneered, pointing at the paper in Clery’s hand.  “We cannot go in there after him.  Besides, he is not a Galathynius, he cannot rule.  The lords rule Terrasen now, like it or no.”  
  
“The King of Adarlan rules Terrasen,” Clery spat.  “You sit and do nothing.”  
  
Darrow just stared at Clery impassively for a long moment before turning to Delaney.  “You, girl, what do you think?”  
  
“What?” she asked, startled.  
  
“We knew him as a boy.  You’ve known him as he’s becoming a man.  What do you think he wants us to do?”  
  
She looked from one man to the other.  While her heart ached to agree with Clery and go after her friend, her head told her he meant to stay.  They could have escaped together that night, and he wouldn’t even let her try to get him out.  The fact that he was still alive and had been made an officer…She spoke hesitantly.  “Aedion - he’s smart.  Smarter than you might think.  He could have gotten out, if not with me, then after.  If I had to guess, he’s got some sort of plan.”  She thought for a minute, all the little stories he’d told her of his cousin, of his country, trying to piece it all together.  “I do know he’s loyal to Terrasen, and wants her freedom.  I know he never stopped grieving his cousin.”  All the men in the room, even Darrow, flinched a little at that.  “I think he wants to rise up in the army, maybe turn it against itself.”  
  
Darrow looked to Clery, cold triumph lighting his eyes.  “For now, we wait.  We heed what he wrote.  Let us see if he tries to make contact with us again.”  
  
“Fine.” Clery threw the map down.  “But I’m putting spies down near the border.”    
  
The lord nodded.  “Concentrate them near Paget’s camp.  That’s where he should be, if my information is correct.”  
  
Clery turned to Delaney.  “Get your horse and your belongings.  You’re moving in here.”  He turned and stalked out of the room, leaving her staring after him, open-mouthed.  Darrow chuckled, a dry sound like sticks rubbing against each other.  
  
“Well, young lady.  If you’re our only link with young Ashryver, looks like you’ve just stepped up in the world.”  He rose, and with a nod to his companions gathered up the map and left.  Delaney realized a bit belatedly that she still had no idea what the message had been, but at least she had fulfilled her promise.  With a sigh, she gathered up her scattered emotions and went to get Horse. 


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning: contains attempted sexual assault, and discussion of previous sexual assault.

Paget’s camp ran like a dream, Aedion decided a month into his tenure there.  The more experienced officers were eager to involve the newer ones, regardless of rank.  They, in turn, helped train the regulars and recruits, rather than that training being left to a couple of lower ranking officers as been protocol at Perrington’s.  As newly made lieutenants, he and his fellows were being taught how to manage large groups of men both in training and in battle, and how to foster obedience to their commanding officer.  Yet respectful debate was encouraged, and good points were listened to regardless of who made them.    
  
It reminded him of Terrasen.  
  
His fellow officers were by and large good men, though there were a couple who seemed to delight too much in their newfound status.  He enjoyed whenever he was paired with them in training, as he got to knock them down a peg or two.  General Paget liked to ride out whenever it was horse work, and even though he was fifty five if he was a day he was still an outstanding horseman and intimidating opponent.  Those were Aedion’s favorite sessions, and Avenar proved her worth again and again.  Then there were the private sessions with Captain Paget.  It was remarkably satisfying to be able to punch something as hard as he could, and the captain had him hold weights to increase his speed even more.  Not to mention the fun of the constant bantering with innuendo that bordered on flirtatious.  Captain Paget - Mikkal - had also insisted that he eat more, so his plate was always loaded.  It still felt like he could never get enough.    
  
And once a week the officers had social time in town.  It was essentially glorified whoring, but Aedion wasn’t about to object.  The evenings off afforded him the time to grab a new book and eat an extra meal before satisfying other appetites.    
  
On one such night he lay on his back, panting, between two women in similar situations.  He had always wondered what one man could manage to do with two women, and it turned out the possibilities far exceeded his imagination.  It had never occurred to him that they might also enjoy each other’s skills; nor how much fun that would be for him to observe.  One of the women stirred, brushing her fingers over his chest, and he pulled her to him for a thorough kiss.  He just needed a few more minutes…  
  
A faint scream hit his ear, and he was out of bed before anyone could blink.  Yanking his pants on, he ran out of the room shirtless and barefoot, the calls of the women he’d left echoing after him.  At the bottom of the stairs, he paused, listening; he could hear muffled sobbing now, coming from down the hall.  Tracking the sound, he burst through the door it came from, ripping the hinges straight off.  Lieutenant Harcourt was in there, pants down, tearing at the clothes of a terrified girl lying prone on the bed.  He froze as Aedion roared in rage and grabbed him by the throat.  As Aedion dragged him through the hallways and out onto the street, Harcourt made enough noise fighting his hold that doors slammed open throughout the inn.    
  
When they reached the open air, Aedion threw him down the front steps.  “What the hell is your problem?” Harcourt yelled as soon as he had breath.    
  
“My problem, you son of a bitch, is that you were about to rape an innocent girl!”  
  
Harcourt tried to laugh derisively, though it came out as more of a squeak.  “You don’t know what you’re talking about, you stupid bastard,” he sneered.  “She wanted it, you had no right to interfere.”  
  
“Her screams would suggest otherwise.”  Aedion could feel himself shifting into a cold rage.  All of his senses were heightened even more than typical; he could hear the heartbeats of the people clustered in the open doorway behind him, could still smell the salt of the girl’s tears, the acidity of her fear.  “You’re so weak you have to prove yourself by taking some poor child by force?”  He spat in the dirt at Harcourt’s feet.  
  
Harcourt lunged at him, and Aedion struck him on the cheek, hard enough to knock him back a little but not enough to break anything.  Swearing, the man charged him again, and Aedion’s knuckles buried themselves in his gut.  Harcourt fell to his knees, retching.  When he’d finished he leaped up, wiping his mouth, and came at him a third time.  One more blow, this one to his ribs, hard enough to bruise bone, had Harcourt down on one knee, gasping out, “You don’t outrank me, you can’t do this!”  
  
“I’ll take the censure if it comes, you fucking prick.”  
  
“I don’t see how you can hold yourself up as some sort of..” he sputtered incoherently for a while, before spitting out, “You fucking killed a man for no good reason.”  
  
“And you would do well to remember that,” Aedion snarled, and Harcourt blanched at the promise of death in his face.  Aedion prowled down the steps and bent low over his fellow lieutenant.  “You might think you’re some sort of stallion who can breed whatever filly he wants,” he murmured softly.  “But I wouldn’t even need a knife to geld you, if you ever touch a woman without her consent again.”  Grabbing the back of Harcourt’s shirt, he yanked him to his feet.  Turning back to the inn, someone tossed him Harcourt’s pants, and he threw them on the ground in front of him.  The crowd parted as he stalked through, but there were a few gentle pats on his back as he passed.  He went to the room where the girl was still clutching at the sheets, sobbing quietly, and knelt gently on the floor next to the bed.    
  
“Are you all right, honey?” he asked gently.  She nodded, then burst into a fresh round of tears.  He sighed, wanting to comfort her but could see his presence was only scaring her more.  The innkeeper’s wife bustled in with a basin of water and a washcloth, and he rose to let her help the girl.  Out in the hallway, the innkeeper was hovering, looking anxious.  Aedion apologized for damaging the door, but the man waved that off, thanking him for intervening.  Now that the situation was under control, he could feel the blackness pressing down on him and fought to retain consciousness.  He trailed back up the stairs to the room, leaning heavily on the bannister, everything around him going gray.  The women were gone, thank the gods.  He almost made it into the bathing room before his knees gave out and he vomited up his dinner.  There were spots in his vision and a buzzing in his ears, as wave after wave of nausea hit him.  Finally he became aware of a cool dry hand on his forehead.  Litton.  His face was grim as he helped Aedion to his feet and handed him his shirt.  He stayed with him while he put on his socks and tied his boots, not speaking, until Aedion stood up to leave.  Then, Litton pulled him into a quick embrace.    
  
“Thank you, my brother,” Aedion said, looking steadily into Litton’s face.  The two men clapped each other’s shoulders, and Aedion headed down to walk home alone.  
  
*****  
  
Mikkal had kept his vow to himself for a full month, which was about three times longer than he had expected to manage given his constant close contact with Lieutenant Ashryver.  Indeed, he was beginning to congratulate himself on his self-control when the man in question swaggered into the officer’s lounge, brushing past him on the way to the small bar.  Like most of the unmarried officers he had evidently spent the evening in town, and he reeked of sex and ladies’ perfume.  Mikkal had stayed at camp ostensibly to finish the week’s reports, taking advantage of everyone’s absence to spread his papers out all over the table in the lounge.  In reality, he wanted to avoid temptation.  
  
It looked like temptation had found him.  
  
No.  He would go back to his quarters and finish up there.  As he started to gather up his files, Ashryver flopped down in the chair opposite, sliding a glass across the table at him before propping his feet up and leaning back.  “Thought you could use a drink,” he said, smiling crookedly.  “I know I’d need one to get through all that shit.”  
  
Mikkal huffed.  “Seems like you’ve had a few already.”  But he picked up the drink and took a sip, rolling it in his mouth before swallowing the burn.  
  
“Not really.”  
  
Mikkal looked at him more closely, at his glittering eyes and the aggression that seemed to be pouring off of him; usually he kept it more tightly leashed.  But he certainly didn’t seem intoxicated.  
  
“What happened?”  
  
“Nothing.  Sir,” Ashryver said, the honorific an afterthought; he got to his feet and prowled over to the bar.  Mikkal waited.  “It’s just…Nothing.”  
  
“You know I’ll hear about it eventually,” Mikkal said evenly.    
  
“There are plenty of women who are ready and willing in town.  Plenty.”  He walked around the room, coming to a halt next to the table, looking down at Mikkal, who nodded, unsure where this was going.  “So why do I have to pull a fellow officer off a fourteen year old girl who’s not?”  
  
That was when Mikkal noticed the bruised and cracked knuckles.  “Who.”  
  
“Harcourt.  Don’t worry, I got there in time.  Barely.  And the bastard’s not going to try anything like that again, or I told him he’d lose the ability permanently.”    
  
At least it was another lieutenant and Ashryver hadn’t assaulted and threatened a superior officer.  Mikkal closed his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose.  Technically, it should have been reported to a superior and they should have dealt with it, but realistically there probably hadn’t been time.  Also, technically, he was reporting it now.  “How badly did you hurt him?”  
  
“He’ll have some good bruises but I didn’t break anything.  Except his sense of entitlement.”  
  
Mikkal laughed; he couldn’t help it.  This camp had never held with taking women by force, though he was aware it was all too common elsewhere.  He would back Ashryver up, and more to the point so would his father.  He held out his hand.  “Let me see.”  
  
Reluctantly, Ashryver reached out with the injured hand.  It was his left, though Mikkal knew by now that he favored his right.  Inspecting the knuckles, Mikkal noticed that several of the fingers were crooked.  “How did you break these?”  He brushed them lightly with his thumb and pretended not to notice the shiver that followed.  
  
“Umm.”  His voice cracked a little.  “They were broken in a fight a few months ago.”  
  
“Why did you punch someone with a hand that’s been broken that recently?”  And how had he not known about this?  He’d been having the boy punch weighted bags for the past month.  
  
“Because if I’d hit him with my right I probably would’ve done a lot more than I meant.”    
  
Mikkal brushed his thumb over the fingers again, then released his hand and looked up into those strange, beautiful eyes.  “How was the rest of your evening?” he asked quietly.  
  
“Satisfactory,” Ashryver replied, that one corner of his mouth hitching up again.  
  
Definitely time to leave.  Mikkal stood, tapped his files against the table a few times to get them to line up, and headed for the door.  Ashryver downed his drink, then turned out the lamp and followed him, reaching him just before he could turn the handle.  That bruised hand appeared over his shoulder to press on the door, holding it closed.  Mikkal turned around to find them inches apart.  His eyes focused on the other man’s mouth, the little dent in the upper lip.  Ashryver was the only man he’d ever met who made him feel small.  It wasn’t so much the few inches in height but the breadth of his frame.  Even though he was lean - too lean, despite all the work they’d been doing to build his body up - he was still utterly overwhelming.  
  
His eyes flicked up and were caught by the intense expression in the lieutenant’s.  Holding his gaze, Ashryver leaned in and covered his mouth with his own.  Mikkal felt himself melting into the kiss, much as he had that first time all those weeks ago.  Ashryver’s tongue brushed his lips and he opened for him.  He reached up to cup his face, to drag him in even deeper, and ended up bashing him in the shoulder with his files.  Ashryver broke off abruptly and looked down at the papers in confusion.    
  
“Ignore it,” Mikkal said, and dropped them on the floor.  Ashryver chuckled and returned to the job at hand, pressing him back against the door, that long lean thigh between his own.  Their hands began roaming over each other’s clothes, and Mikkal couldn’t stop his body’s response, didn’t even want to.  Ashryver clearly felt it pressing into his hip and he gave a soft groan into his mouth.  He tugged harder at Mikkal’s shirt, sliding those callused fingers directly over heated skin as soon as he found a gap.  Mikkal let his own hand wander down, feeling the smooth ridges of the younger man’s muscles through the thin fabric, then down further to palm him gently through his pants.  Ashryver jerked slightly with a soft curse, then leaned into the touch, continuing to explore Mikkal’s back with his hand.    
  
Suddenly he froze, listening intently to something Mikkal couldn’t hear.  “Shit,” he whispered.  “The others are back.”  Mikkal wondered how he knew.  “What should we do?”  
  
He heard it then, the faintest of voices.  “I don’t…” He couldn’t think over the roaring of blood through his veins.  Ashryver kissed him once more, softly, then pulled away.  Picking up the papers, he handed them to Mikkal, then moved him gently out of the way.  Opening the door, he sauntered casually into the night.  Mikkal could hear the other men calling out a drunken greeting, and Ashryver replying in kind.  He waited until the men had passed, then slipped out and headed to his quarters.  An hour later, he was laying in his bed, staring at the ceiling, fighting an absurd urge to cry.  
  
*****  
  
A month had passed.  A month of living in relative luxury, delivering letters, and waiting.  In which Delaney had learned nothing of the message she had brought hundreds of miles to Terrasen.  In which there were whispers on the street of the resurrection of a prince thought dead, of rebellion, of the rousing of the Bane.  In which there were hushed meetings behind closed doors and people coming and going in the night.  In which nobody smiled, but everybody began to feel a tiny spark, smothered long ago, glowing deep in the ashes of Terrasen.  
  
*****  
  
The weeks continued to slip by.  The lieutenants were divided into pairs to start working with regulars, organizing drills and planning forays out into the field.  Aedion was paired with Amond.  He was a nice enough fellow; the third son of a minor lord, he had ended up in the military more or less by accident and seemed determined to make the best of it.  Together they schemed and organized and trained, and Aedion loved every second of it.  Loved finding the rhythm of the work, the new ways to challenge the men and keep them interested, breaking the monotony of routine while not disrupting the comfort that comes with familiarity.  And he loved the few stolen moments he found with Mikkal, their brief clashes of lips and breath that never went farther but somehow left him more sated than his trysts with women in town.  
  
One afternoon, Major Ivry asked him to run into town to pick up something for his wife.  He liked Mrs. Ivry; she was cheerful and funny and so pregnant she looked like she was going to rupture at any moment.  Hopping on Avenar, who needed the exercise and made the first few moments of the ride interesting, he made it into town to the herbalist just moments before the skies opened in a summer squall.  While waiting out the worst of it, the innkeeper’s wife saw him and began making a fuss.  Naturally this drew the older generation of women out of the woodwork who all clustered around him, telling him how noble he was, how wonderful it was to have officers with such a sense of honor, and so handsome too.  Flushing beet red, he made his excuses and grabbed Avenar from her tie under the building’s overhang.  The rain had lightened some, but he and his horse were both soaked through before they passed through the gates.  At least the herbs were safe in their waxed paper in his satchel, and he handed them off to Mrs. Ivry.  
  
“Oh, thank you, Lieutenant.  I’d have gone myself, but the major wouldn’t have any of that.  He told me he couldn’t have me be dropping the baby on the public street.  And here I’ve got another month to go!”  She laughed, shaking her head at the ridiculousness of men, and patted Aedion on the cheek.  He bowed and retreated, blushing fiercely again and cursing his complexion.    
  
Once safely in his room, he realized he was dripping all over the floor.  Stripping off his sodden clothes, he toweled off and then began digging through his wardrobe.  Shit.  He’d forgotten that he’d sent his spare shirt to the laundry for repair.  With a sigh, he pulled out a short-sleeved training shirt.  It wasn’t protocol to wear off the pitch, but he could get a fresh shirt from the laundry before dinner.  
  
He was about the pull the shirt over his head when there was a token tap on the door and Mikkal entered, focused on a paper in his hand.  “Sorry to intrude, Ashryver, Litton said…” he trailed off as he looked up and realized he had just walked into a room with a very naked Aedion in it.  
  
Aedion raised an eyebrow.  “What did Litton say?”  A grin began to spread across his face at Mikkal’s distraction, those amber eyes roving over his body.    
  
“He, umm.  He said you were, um, in here.”  He dragged his eyes up to meet Aedion’s, then reached behind him and closed the door.    
  
“So I am,” Aedion said, and closed the distance between them in two strides.  “What did you need?” he murmured in Mikkal’s ear.    
  
“It can wait,” he replied, dropping the paper on the small desk by the door and pulling Aedion down the couple inches to meet his lips.    
  
It was so easy, Aedion thought, slipping his tongue into Mikkal’s mouth, so easy to lose himself in this man.  He yanked Mikkal’s shirt free and pulled back to watch him tug it over his head.  Then they were chest to chest, and he savored the skin on skin contact, the feel of those hard muscles against his own.  Their hands roamed, and it was getting hard to tell where he ended and Mikkal began.  So easy to lose himself, and to love being lost.  
  
Which was why he didn’t feel the wave of icy black coming until it crashed over him and dragged him under.  
  
*****  
  
Mikkal had never felt so helpless in all his life as he did when Aedion collapsed in his arms.  It was too sudden and Aedion too big for him to do more than control the fall.  At first he thought it was some sort of seizure, but Aedion’s eyes were open and staring, horror-filled, as if it were more of a waking nightmare.  Then the retching began, and he helped him onto his hands and knees as bile poured out of his mouth and nose.  This must be what Litton had told him about when he came to him the day after the incident with Harcourt.  No wonder Litton had been so shaken.  
  
It seemed to last forever.  He thought about calling for help as more spasms of nausea wracked that huge frame, but he didn’t want to have to explain the lack of clothing.  And Litton had said he’d come out of it on his own eventually.  So he waited, crouched on the floor with one arm steadying his shoulders, using his body to stabilize them both until finally Aedion pulled away and sat down, back against the wall, arms resting on his knees.  There was an odd sort of defiance in the tear-bright eyes, and Mikkal sat back and waited quietly, not breaking eye contact.  
  
He must be ill, somehow.  When he had burst in on Aedion he had been first struck by his sheer beauty, but it hadn’t escaped him that despite his muscle mass, those bones were far too clearly visible.  Holding him as he had been sick made it even more obvious.  Mikkal wondered how long it had been going on, how he had successfully hidden it.  He certainly ate plenty, more than any of the others, especially since they’d decided he was underweight, but if anything he seemed to be getting leaner.  “I want you to see the healer,” he finally said, little louder than a whisper.  
  
“I’m fine,” Aedion replied.  He leaned his head back until it rested against the wall, closing his eyes and rubbing his face.  
  
“You’re not fine.  You’re losing weight, you’re vomiting -”     
  
Aedion dropped his hands and glared at him.  “I don’t want to see the healer,” he snapped.  “There’s nothing wrong, this just…happens sometimes.”     
  
Mikkal thought for a moment.  Behind the flash of anger there was a glimmer of fear, and he supposed that having the official camp healer diagnose him with some sort of illness could impact his status.  “What if I took you to an outside healer?”  
  
“What?”    
  
Mikkal stood and grabbed the paper he’d brought off the desk.  “I was coming to ask you if you were familiar at all with Oakwald.  I’ve been assigned to do a little scouting training there, and I wanted to visit beforehand to plan.  But I haven’t spent much time in the forest, and I thought perhaps you had.”  
  
Aedion nodded warily.  “Yes, I know the forest well, at least on the Terrasen side.”  
  
“So…what if we go together to plan the training exercise, and find a healer on the way?”  
  
“I’m telling you, I don’t need a healer.”  
  
Mikkal smiled, a slow, lazy smile that he knew would get under Aedion’s skin.  “Then it will be a short visit.”  
  
Lurching to his feet, Aedion stalked to his bureau and pulled on some pants, then picked the shirt up from where he had discarded it and pulled it over his head.  “You’re not going to let this go, are you.”  
  
“Would it help if I made it an order?”  
  
Cursing, Aedion went to his washbasin, poured himself a glass of water, and rinsed his mouth several times.  Then he crossed back to Mikkal, pushing into his space, but Mikkal planted his feet.  They stared at each other, so close that details blurred.  “Fine,” he said, and his breath hitting Mikkal’s cheek almost made him shiver.  “I’ll see a healer, but only because I want to take this trip with you.”  
  
Mikkal’s reply was not in words.  
  
*****  
  
Delaney came down to breakfast one morning to find a stranger sitting at the table.  Clery had still not descended, but the fair-haired man seemed quite at home despite his dusty clothes and pungent smell.  He looked up from happily slapping jam on a piece of toast.  “Good morning, miss,” he greeted her in a cheerful Adarlanian accent, slurping some coffee.    
  
“Good morning,” she murmured automatically, and sat down a bit dazedly in her usual chair.  Shaking her head to clear it, she pulled the silver teapot closer and poured herself a cup, adding her usual heaping teaspoon of sugar.  Clery burst into the room, making Delaney slosh her tea everywhere, and pulled the stranger into an enthusiastic hug.    
  
“Fulke!  I didn’t expect you back so soon.  When did you return?”  
  
“About twenty minutes ago,” Fulke replied with a grin.  “I came straight here, as you can see.”  He gestured to his stained clothes.  
  
“And what news from Paget’s camp?”  
  
Delaney startled at the name and leaned forward, feeling her pulse all the way in her fingertips.    
  
Fulke settled back in his chair with the air of someone preparing to tell a good story.  “Well, it seems the new lieutenant class has made a bit of a splash.  All was pretty quiet in town when I arrived.  I was staying at the main inn, just like we talked about, trying to feel out if there might be some work available in the camp itself.  I’d only been there three days when I was wakened out of a sound sleep by a ruckus the likes of which I’ve never heard before.  Out on the front step was a half-naked giant of a man, beating the shit out of some fool lieutenant who’d evidently tried to take a young girl to bed against her will.  It was young Ashryver.”  He shook his head, chuckling.  
  
“Ashryver tried to rape a young girl?” Clery asked, aghast.  Delaney almost laughed, the idea was so ludicrous, and Fulke looked contrite at the misunderstanding.  
  
“No, no, he was doing the beating.  And let me tell you, there’s no doubt that boy was trained by Rhoe.  Dropped the man in three blows.  Nobody in that camp is ever going to force a woman as long as he’s around, not after that.”  
  
Clery sagged in relief.  “And you’re sure it’s him.”  
  
“No doubt.  He looks just the same, only bigger.  Could never mistake those eyes, anyway.”  
  
“Aedion’s all right?” Delaney interjected, needing to hear the confirmation.  Fulke looked at her in some confusion.  
  
“Sorry, this is Delaney, the girl who brought us the message,” Clery introduced her.  “Delaney, Fulke is one of my…associates.”  
  
“I’m one of his spies, he means,” Fulke said, adding, “Come on, man, it’s gotta be obvious,” in response to Clery’s glare.  
  
“But Aedion really is all right.”  She would not be deterred.  
  
Fulke nodded.  “Yes, he certainly is.”  Her eyes filled with tears, and she blinked furiously.  The fair-haired man smiled at her kindly.  “You must have been…close.”  
  
She couldn’t help but smile at that, knowing what he was implying.  “He’s like my brother,” she said.  “As dear to me as my real one.”  
  
Clery began questioning about more general matters then, and Delaney paid close attention even though her heart was singing.  Fulke answered in great detail about the layout of the town, the proximity to the camp, the frequency of visits from the officers, and the ease of traveling there from Terrasen.  Evidently despite Clery’s acquiescence to Darrow, he was still developing a contingency to get Aedion out of Adarlan altogether if necessary.  
  
After breakfast, she was sent out with just one letter, but it was to a country house well away from the city.  Part of her wondered if it was to get her out of the way while Clery and Fulke plotted, but she didn’t mind.  It was a glorious day in high summer, and even Horse didn’t seem to object too much to being ridden out, though that may have been because of all the tall grass lining the road.  As the sun beat down on her and she could practically feel her smattering of freckles darkening, she thought about Fulke.  About the advantages Terrasen could find in having spies of Adarlanian descent.  About her own skill in getting around unnoticed, and her longing to do something other than eating all of Clery’s food and waiting, always waiting.  After delivering the letter and receiving her reply - and a delicious lunch, courtesy of the bustling cook - she returned to the city.    
  
Dropping the letter onto Clery’s desk, she stood straight and proud before him and announced, “I want to learn to be a spy.”  
  
*****  
  
Aedion shouldn’t have been surprised at the ease with which Mikkal arranged their trip, but he was.  They would travel due west to a small town that bordered Oakwald forest, then spend two or three days exploring the area to determine how best to set up the scout training.  The training itself would take place in a month or two, after the lieutenants were all made and had received their assignments.  Which meant it was possible neither Aedion nor Mikkal would be present for the actual training, so their notes would have to be meticulous.  
  
Avenar seemed glad to be on the road again, or perhaps she was feeding off Aedion’s mood.  The weather was glorious, and the rich scents of baking earth and growing plants filled his nostrils.  He and Mikkal joked and laughed for most of the trip, interspersed with brief snatches of more serious talk about the challenges of training in the forest compared to on the plains.  It was well past noon and getting on towards evening when they reached the tiny town, little more than a village.  Mikkal asked a passing farmer if there was a town healer, and they were directed to a small cottage right on the outskirts, backing up against the woods.  
  
The healer was a pleasant faced, pleasantly curved middle-aged woman who nonetheless made Aedion edgy.  She welcomed them into her cottage, directing him into a clean, bright room that smelled pungently of herbs.  As Mikkal followed him into the room, she glared at him.  “And who are you?” she demanded, hands on her hips.  
  
“I’m his commanding officer,” Mikkal replied, drawing himself up to his full height.  
  
She glanced at Aedion, comically unimpressed.  “Is it all right with you if he stays?”  
  
“It’s fine, he’s the reason I’m here,” he said with a disarming smile, adding silently in his head, Because I’m incapable of saying no to him.  
  
She closed the door and, gesturing Aedion onto a stool, sat on a small chair opposite him.  Mikkal hovered behind him.  “What brings you here today?”  
  
Feeling a bit foolish, he replied, “I’m having trouble putting on weight.”  
  
She looked him up and down with a knowing eye.  “Is that the sole complaint?”  
  
Aedion started to say yes, but Mikkal spoke over him.  “And you’re having those episodes.”  
  
Nearly growling, Aedion turned to Mikkal and snapped, “I’m not having episodes.”  Turning back to the healer, he added more gently, “I’m not.”  
  
“You’ve had two that I know of,” Mikkal retorted, not backing down an inch.  “Yes,” he said in response to Aedion’s self-conscious look, “I got the full report of what happened with Harcourt, so don’t give me any bullshit about it.”  
  
The healer was watching them with some amusement.  “Define episodes.”  
  
“He collapses.”  
  
She turned to Aedion for confirmation.  “If I get…upset, or emotional,” he said with a warning glare at Mikkal, “I vomit and get light-headed.”  
  
Making a few notes on a small pad of paper, she asked, “How often does that happen?”  
  
He shrugged.  “It varies.  I can go a month or more with nothing, then have two in a week.”  
  
After asking a few more basic questions and jotting the answers down, she asked him to remove his shirt and examined him carefully, making more notes after examining his eyes and his mouth, then pressing an ear to his chest.  “How well do you sleep?” she asked, as she probed his abdomen.    
  
“It’s inconsistent.  Sometimes like the dead, other times I can’t settle, especially if I don’t fight or…” he trailed off, reluctant to say “fuck” to this motherly woman.  
  
“Have relations?” she suppled drily.  He nodded, feeling the blood rise to his face.  
  
“Well,” Mikkal muttered, “when it comes to that, I have the same problem.”  
  
Finishing her examination, she pulled back and tapped her pen against her leg.  “Can you shift?”  He sat up straighter and eyed her warily, twisting his shirt in his hands.  
  
“Shift?” Mikkal asked.  “What’s shift?”  
  
Aedion ignored him, staring the healer right in the eye as she gazed back calmly.  He gave in first.  “No.”  
  
“Could you…before?” She waved her hand in the air, and he knew she meant before magic vanished.  He shook his head, biting his cheek to keep from laughing at Mikkal’s baffled expression.  
  
“Was it your mother or your father?”    
  
“It was,” he thought back to what he’d been told, “my mother’s…grandmother, I believe.”  
  
She shook her head.  “That’s impossible.  It’s way too strong to be that distant.”  
  
“What’s too strong?” Mikkal interjected.  “What are you talking about?”  
  
“Mikkal. Shut. Up,” Aedion hissed.  
  
“Commanding officer, you say?” the healer asked Mikkal sweetly, and he cursed under his breath.  
  
“My cousin could shift, though my senses are better,” Aedion said, turning back to her.  “We shared the same amount of blood.  We were told it just bred true in our generation.”  
  
“Hmm.”  The syllable was dripping with skepticism.  “Who was your father?”  
  
His lips tightened slightly.  “Unknown; I’m a bastard.”  
  
“Isn’t that the truth,” Mikkal supplied quietly.  If Aedion could have cold-cocked him without upsetting the healer, he would have.  
  
The woman studied her paper, then him, continuing to ignore Mikkal.  “How old are you?” she asked abruptly.  
  
“Sixteen.”    
  
“And you?” she said, turning to Mikkal.    
  
“Twenty four,” he responded automatically.  She gave him a disapproving glare.  “What?” he asked defensively, but she just turned back to Aedion.    
  
“How often do you eat?”  
  
Aedion’s brow furrowed.  “Uh, three times a day?  Sometimes four, if I can manage it.”  
  
She stood with a derisive snort.  “Well, then, there’s your problem.  Don’t you know demi-fae have to eat at least six times a day during adolescence?  You’re burning up the food too fast to follow human eating habits.”  Mikkal looked so shocked Aedion thought a strong breeze would take him off his feet.  “Of course, if you settle, you’ll be able to eat far less often.”  She ushered him to his feet, then opened the door to the small room and swept into the hallway, saying over her shoulder “Now, I’ve got to be going, if you don’t mind; I need to collect some herbs before dark.”  The men followed her, Mikkal still looking like he’d been punched in the balls, Aedion feeling a bit the same.  They were nearly out the door when Mikkal stopped.  
  
“Wait, what about the episodes?  Why is he collapsing?” he asked.    
  
The healer looked at Aedion for a long moment, expression unfathomably sad.  “A totally normal response to trauma,” she said quietly.  He looked at the ground, unable to hold her clear-eyed gaze.  
  
“Trauma?”  Mikkal repeated in little more than a whisper.  
  
Throwing a red cloak over her shoulders, she locked her door behind her and patted Aedion on the arm as she passed.  “Be honest with your lover,” she said.  “And eat more frequently.”  With that, she walked into the woods and disappeared.  
  
*****  
  
It was a quiet ride back into the town proper.  Once, a number of years ago, Mikkal had taken a colt out that was only just started under saddle.  The horse had shied at a bird and set off in a series of back-cracking bucks; on the fourth leap, Mikkal had sailed over the colt’s head and landed flat on his back.  He still remembered the feeling of being utterly unable to move air, of feeling the earth sway beneath him even though he was laying down, of the nauseating spinning of his head.  He felt somewhat like that now.  
  
Not that it was really so shocking that Aedion had fae blood, when you considered his size, his speed, and his strength.  He wondered if his father knew. If the King knew.  Remembering his recent conversation with his father, he suspected they did.  The general had pulled him aside before this trip and warned him to be careful of the young lieutenant.  
  
Mikkal had laughed.  “I don’t need to worry about Ashryver,” he’d assured his father.  “I’ve never raped a woman, and I don’t plan on starting now.”  
  
The general had huffed.  “I certainly hope not, son, or you’d have more than Ashryver to worry about.  Just…don’t forget what he’s capable of.”  Mikkal had pointed out that Aedion had deliberately used his off hand when he had punished Harcourt, and the general had looked grim.  “I know, son, and that’s part of what worries me.  A man who can show that type of control when he’s in a rage like that?  It’s not just you who needs to be worried about Ashryver.  We all do.”  
  
He was still a bit lost in his thoughts when they reached the inn and requested a room for the night.  “One room or two?” the innkeeper asked.  He hesitated, uncertain what to say.  
  
“Do you have a room with two beds?” Aedion asked smoothly.  He turned to Mikkal.  “Might as well save the general the coin.”    
  
“Of course,” the innkeeper said, and showed the to a large, airy room on the  top floor.  Mikkal ordered food, and then stopped the man before he departed and asked for another meal to be sent up right before the kitchens closed.  Aedion flashed him a quick smile in appreciation, then dropped his pack on the floor and fell back on one of the beds, just staring at the ceiling.  Mikkal sat on the other bed and pulled off his boots, wiggling his toes in relief.  He needed new ones, he noted idly; these ones always seemed to pinch.  
  
After several minutes of silence, Aedion sat up and pulled off his own boots, setting them neatly by the bed.  Then he met Mikkal’s eyes and just…waited.  
  
Mikkal opened his mouth to ask some sort of brilliant question about the implications of being demi-fae, but what blurted out was, “Does the age difference bother you?”  
  
Aedion gaped at him in disbelief, then started laughing.  “After all that came out during that examination, that’s what you got caught up on?” he asked once he was able to recover his breath.  There was a knock on the door before Mikkal could reply, and he opened it to allow in a man carrying a tray with two heaping plates on it.  After setting the food and silver on the small table, Mikkal gave him a copper and the man bowed and retreated.  
  
Mikkal sat at the table and picked up his fork; Aedion sat opposite him and fell on the food as a man starving.  Which, Mikkal thought with a twinge of guilt, he was.  “Yes,” he answered the question asked several minutes ago.  “It’s been bothering me for a while, actually.”  
  
Aedion came up for air and met his eyes.  “Really?”  He nodded.  “How long?”  
  
“Since I read your file.”  He gave a short, humorless laugh and decided he might as well confess.  “Otherwise I probably would’ve invited you to my bed a while ago.”  
  
Taking another bite, Aedion chewed thoughtfully for a moment.  “But I’ve bedded women your age and nobody thinks twice about it.”  
  
That hadn’t actually occurred to him.  “Well, but…it’s different with women.”  
  
“Why?”  
  
That was an excellent question.  Mikkal searched his mind for a reason.  “They’re less predatory.”  
  
Aedion choked.  When he had finished coughing, he said wryly, “You’re fucking different women than I am, then.”  They ate in silence for a while, and finally Aedion set down his silver and leaned back in the chair.  “Let me get this straight.  I’ve been raised for war, trained for it since I could lift a wooden sword.  I’ve killed a dozen men that I know about, most of them when I was fourteen.  Are you telling me I’m old enough to kill a man, but not old enough to love one?”  
  
There was no answer to that.  Mikkal didn’t want to even consider the ramifications of that word, even as a wild joy flared through him.  He cast about for a different topic.  “And you’re fae.”  
  
Those turquoise eyes showed no surprise from the abrupt change in subject.  “Only part.  It’s not a secret.”  Mikkal narrowed his own eyes at him, and that one corner of his mouth lifted slightly.  “I’m an Ashryver,” he said by way of explanation.  “All Ashryvers have fae blood,” he added at Mikkal’s blank look.  “It might not be common knowledge over here, but I’m sure the King knows.  Probably how the healer did, come to think of it.”  Finishing his food, he stood and stretched, then pulled a book out of his pack and sat on his bed, back against the headboard, long legs crossed at the ankles.  The book sat on his lap, unopened.  Mikkal rose and sat himself at the foot of the same bed, pulling Aedion’s feet into his lap and beginning to massage them.    
  
There was something intimate about it, some dropping of a barrier as Aedion gave a little moan of pleasure.  He peeled off the socks and dug his thumbs into the ball of one foot, enjoying the feel of the strong arch and the smooth calluses beneath his fingers. “I’ve been in war camps my whole life,” Mikkal said quietly, watching his hands work, “and I trained in Rifthold for a year.  I fought in Terrasen and then in Fenharrow.  I’ve seen almost every torture that can be devised for a man.”  He glanced briefly up at Aedion’s guarded face before returning to his task.  “You don’t have to tell me what happened to you, but you can.  It won’t change how I feel about you.”  
  
Aedion was silent for so long Mikkal was sure he wasn’t going to answer.  Then, in a soft voice so cracked with pain it didn’t even belong to him, he began.  He told about the confrontation with the man who’d broken his fingers, about the ambush with the colonel.  About being brought around with smelling salts solely so he would feel the terror of being trapped, the pain of the repeated violations.  About the threats and mocking words that had been whispered in his ear, the pinches to his thighs and balls every time he threatened to lose consciousness again.  About the overwhelming smell of blood and sex and his own fear that had saturated the room.  Mikkal kept his eyes down, barely daring to breathe, just absorbing the pain and humiliation that poured off this man he knew now, in this moment, he loved.  Only when Aedion admitted that it was exhaustion alone that had kept him from throwing himself off the watchtower afterwards did Mikkal’s own tears start to fall.  
  
“So you see,” he concluded so quietly Mikkal had to lean closer to hear him, “I want to…be with you, but I…” Aedion’s voice broke completely then and Mikkal all but lunged to gather him in his arms.  Pulling him to his chest, he rocked him gently while Aedion’s whole body strained to control his weeping.  Mikkal sang to him as he held him, just the nonsense songs his mother used to sing when he was upset, over and over until his voice was growing hoarse and Aedion finally began to cry himself out.    
  
As Aedion quieted, Mikkal still held him close, gently brushing back that golden hair with his fingers.  Slowly, he felt him relax, and he pressed a gentle kiss to his forehead.  They lay pressed together, Aedion’s head on his shoulder, their legs tangled.  Mikkal felt grateful for the tranquil closeness that came from the purging of such pain.  Eventually he realized that Aedion had fallen asleep, and he smiled a little despite himself as he rested his cheek against the top of his head.  
  
He himself was fully awake.  The sky outside the windows was finally darkening, a rich deep blue stained with orange and pink at the bottom.  The day’s revelations crawled through his brain.  It was hard not to be angry at himself for not picking up on what had happened to Aedion; now that he knew, it seemed obvious.  He thought of the note he had found in his pocket after leaving the healer.  _Be patient_ , it had said in a beautiful flowing script.  _Be kind_.  
  
Aedion shifted slightly in his sleep, tucking himself in closer.  Mikkal realized that he had lied earlier when he had told Aedion the story wouldn’t affect how he felt towards him.  Well, not so much lied as been wrong.  He had known, before Aedion started talking, that he was brave; yet the guts it took to sit there in the lamp light and lay bare those soul scars was something he had never seen.  He couldn’t even comprehend it, it was so different from his brand of hot-blooded courage that took soldiers into battle.  Until tonight, he had cared for Aedion, had been attracted by him, even to the point of distraction; but now, this draw he felt was something he didn’t dare name for fear of destroying it.  The arm trapped underneath the broad shoulders began to tingle and slowly go numb, but he didn’t move.  This was the first time since he met him that Aedion had ever actually seemed content, and he couldn’t risk ruining that. So he waited, grateful for this moment of peace, wishing it would never end.  
  
  
  
  
  
  



	10. Chapter 10

A light tap on the door startled Aedion awake, and he was in a half-crouch reaching for a dagger before he knew where he was.  “It’s all right, it’s just the food,” came Mikkal’s voice, and he blinked.  As his sleep-fogged vision cleared the bed shifted underneath him.  Mikkal rose to answer the door.  Aedion rubbed his face with his hands, trying to orient himself as the delicious meaty aroma of stew permeated the room and the door closed behind the servant.    
  
After setting the tray on the table, Mikkal turned to him.  Avoiding his eyes, Aedion scooted off the bed and went into the bathing room.  He sat on the floor with his back against the closed door and rested his head in his hands.  What in Hellas’ name was he thinking telling Mikkal - his commanding officer, the son of his general - about that mess?  It was like he had been possessed by some sort of big-mouthed truth-telling demon who was determined to ruin his life.  Now he’d destroyed what slim chance he’d had of ever being able to fulfill his promise to Terrasen.  There was no way they’d promote someone who would accuse a general and a corporal of rape.  Gods knew, it might even be something that could get him court-martialed.  Shit.   
  
He thought back to the visit with that healer, who had somehow known all his secrets and had been worried about letting Mikkal in to hear them.  Really it was Mikkal’s reaction to all of those revelations that had somehow fooled him into thinking it was safe to bare his soul-scars.  The fact that the captain learned that his lieutenant was partly a different species, and all he really cared about was that Aedion was comfortable with their age difference…  And yet the healer had told him to be honest.  The thought of walking out into that room, seeing the revulsion in Mikkal’s eyes, made his head hurt, or maybe it was his heart.  Abruptly he missed Delaney, her clever wariness.  She would never have let Mikkal worm his way into his heart; no, she would’ve smacked him on the shoulder and ordered him to get his brain out of his cock and into his head where it belonged.  
  
Resisting the temptation to bash his head against the wall for a while, he hauled himself to his feet and opened the door.  Mikkal was sitting on the far bed, flipping through a book.  He looked up and dropped it on the bed as he stretched and stood.  They studied each other.  There was no pity in the amber eyes to grate on Aedion’s nerves, no look of disgust.  Just the quick assessing sweep of a commanding officer, then a gesture at the table.  “You should eat, the food’s going to get cold.”   
  
His throaty voice triggered a memory.  “You were singing to me,” Aedion said.  Mikkal nodded, looking a little self-conscious.    
  
Aedion sat at the table and picked up the spoon.  “Why is there only one bowl?” he asked.  
  
Mikkal took the chair opposite him.  “Because I don’t need to eat six times a day, unless I want to be the size of Avenar,” he said, a small, cautious smile pulling at his lips.    
  
“You’re sure you don’t want some?”    
  
“I’m sure.”    
  
Aedion toyed with the spoon, dipping it into the stew then allowing the liquid to dribble back into the bowl, though his stomach was growling loud enough for passersby to hear.  “Are you going to tell your father?”  
  
Hurt flashed across Mikkal’s face.  “Tell him what?  That Perrington’s a sadistic brute who ought to be hanged from the castle clock tower and Malins is no better?”  There was anger roughening his voice.  “My father knows that, believe me.  Everyone does.  He was the first one to warn me about Perrington when I was looking to go to a different camp.”  Aedion reeled; he had forgotten that Breiner had warned him as well.  Mikkal went on, more gently,  “No, Aedion, I’m not going to tell him.  It’s not my story to tell.”  He got up and walked to the bathing room, trailing his fingers over Aedion’s shoulder as he passed.  Aedion couldn’t remember the last time he’d been touched like that - no demand, no expectation, just that casual need to tactilely confirm the existence of the other person.    
  
As the water started running in the other room, he began eating mechanically, not tasting the food.  His mind was swirling, flashing over images of Breiner’s concerned face, Delaney crouching behind the stables, Perrington standing on the gallows platform, taunting him. He had known Perrington wanted to destroy him.  He had known, yet somehow he had gotten caught up in the routine of camp and let those rhythms lull him into forgetfulness.  
  
The bathing room door swung open and Mikkal emerged, dressed only in the light camp-issued pants all the soldiers favored.  Aedion stood up and went to him, slowly, uncertain why he trusted him, why he was so drawn.  Mikkal just watched him, expression unreadable but tension evident in his long, lean limbs.  Aedion put his hands on Mikkal’s waist and bent his head just enough that their foreheads touched.  Mikkal closed his eyes and relaxed against him.  They stood like that for several long breaths.  
  
“I don’t know what to say,” Aedion finally murmured.  
  
“You don’t need to say anything.  Just…know I would never…”  
  
Aedion brought his hands up then to cup Mikkal’s jaw, tilting his head up enough for their mouths to meet.  “I know,” he whispered against his lips.  “I know.”  
  
When they finally pulled apart, Aedion hands had slipped down to Mikkal’s ribcage.  There was an ugly jagged scar between two ribs near Aedion’s left thumb, and he brushed over it, frowning a little.  Somehow he had expected Mikkal to be unmarred, but that olive skin was flecked with more scars than his own.  “How’d you get this?”   
  
Mikkal glanced down to where Aedion’s attention was focused.  “Took a dagger between the ribs in Fenharrow last year.  Collapsed my lung, nicked a blood vessel right here.”  He touched where the scar hit the underside of the rib.  “That was the fastest bit of battlefield surgery you’ll ever see,” he added with a humorless smile.  
  
A dagger to the chest…He was lucky to be alive.  Aedion crouched and pressed his lips to the irregular white line, and Mikkal shivered.  He did the same to the scar on his left pectoral, and the one on his right shoulder.  There were more, too many more.  He had never truly realized until that moment that this beautiful, kind, gentle man had fought and killed just as he had.  He didn’t know why, but it made his heart break.    
  
When Aedion had finished marking all the scars, Mikkal’s body was tight with tension of a different sort.  But his amber eyes were soft as he murmured, “We should probably get some sleep.”  Aedion nodded, though his own body was humming despite its exhaustion.  Reluctantly detaching himself, he went into the bathing room to wash his face and clean his teeth.  When he came back out, the lights were out except the lamp next to Mikkal’s bed, and the captain was sitting up reading a book Aedion recognized as his own.  He looked up with a broad grin.  
  
“You actually read this shit?”  
  
Aedion returned the grin. “Of course!  I think I need the instruction.  After all, I’ve learned more words for breasts in that book…Don’t you find it entertaining?”  
  
“I don’t know, the romancing of fine ladies has never been of much interest to me.  Though no doubt my mother would explode with joy if it was.  It would justify all her efforts to link me with a suitable young woman.”  
  
Aedion laughed.  “Is that a hobby of hers, then?”  
  
“Why do you think she keeps dragging me into town?”  
  
“And what is of interest to you?” Aedion asked, pulling back the covers on his own bed before removing the dagger from his hip and peeling off his shirt.    
  
“Well at the moment, oversized part fae lieutenants from Wendlyn,” Mikkal said, watching every move Aedion made.  “Know any books about those?”  
  
“No,” Aedion said, settling himself under the sheets.  “But you could write one.”  
  
Mikkal blew out the lamp.  “I think I need to do more research first,” he said as the room fell into darkness.    
  
Aedion chuckled.  “I can help you with that.”  
  
“Good night, Aedion.”  
  
“Good night.”    
  
*****  
  
Mikkal lay in bed, staring at the ceiling.  Gods, this was not easy.  His body was aching, nearly crying out, and he sternly ordered it to shut up.  But when he closed his eyes, he could still feel Aedion’s lips brushing his scars, touching all his worst memories with such tenderness it was unbearable.    
  
He could have kept going.  Could have eased those pants off, gripped him, put his mouth on him…His cock twitched and he dug his fingernails into his thighs.  This is ridiculous, he told himself, opening his eyes to stare at the ceiling.  You are a captain in the King’s army.    
  
Rolling onto his side, he cast his mind about for something else, anything else, and settled on their plans for the next few days.  He knew little of Oakwald, despite having traveled through it a number of time.  All he really remembered were rumors, tales of Little Folk, of magic, of immortal stags and fae.  But the fae had been exterminated by the King’s special forces, and the Little Folk, if they had ever really existed, had disappeared when magic had.   He wondered what legends Aedion had learned, and if he would share any as they explored and planned.   
  
He thought he had drifted off and begun dreaming when he felt the covers lift and the bed sink as a large, warm body slid next to him.  Reaching out instinctively, he wrapped his arms around that body and pulled it in close.  Then soft lips met his and heat flared through him, burning off any haze of sleep.  Mikkal responded eagerly before he noticed an off note in the kiss, in the hands roaming his back; a kind of desperation that was more than just the need he himself was feeling.  He pulled back sharply.  
  
“What’s wrong?” Aedion asked, the huskiness in his voice making his accent more pronounced.  
  
 Mikkal shook his head, trying to clear it.  Aedion was trembling slightly next to him, and he couldn’t tell if it was from desire or fear.  That was enough to make him prop himself up on his elbow, needing the slight increase in distance.  The faint light of the stars through the window was just enough to see by.  “Aedion…”  
  
“What?” he asked again, a touch defiantly.  
  
“I don’t want to fuck you,” Mikkal said, realizing when Aedion’s entire body went taut as if he’d been struck that it was the wrong thing to say.  “No,” he went on quickly, putting a hand on that broad chest before he could leave, “that’s not what I meant.  I don’t just want to fuck you, I’ve done that with plenty of people.  I want to make love to you.  I want to take my time learning every inch of you.  I want to know what makes you moan, what makes you so crazy you forget your own name.  I want to wake up so wrapped up with you that I can’t tell where I end and you begin.  I want…”  He trailed off, unsure what Aedion was thinking; those beautiful eyes were focused on the door, impossible for him to read.  After what seemed like an eternity, they flicked back to him.    
  
Mikkal bent down, brushing his nose gently against Aedion’s, then breathing a kiss on each cheekbone before returning to his mouth.  Aedion responded slowly, hesitantly.  Breaking away gently, he rolled onto his back, pulling Aedion with him so that the golden head was resting on his shoulder.  At first the huge frame remained rigid, and he began tracing soothing circles on the broad back.  One of Aedion’s arms eased around his chest, then a long leg intertwined with his own.  
  
After a long time, Mikkal could feel Aedion begin to relax against him.  He began singing quietly again, his favorite lullaby about the Avery River saying good night to the forest, then the plains; to the animals and the trees, the flowers and the stars.  As the river said good night to Rifthold, to the bustle of people and the twinkling of the lights, Mikkal felt Aedion’s breathing slow, every muscle go slack, and he looked down to see the lids drop over those brilliant eyes.  Sleep began pulling at him in a tidal rhythm, claiming him completely soon after the river’s song greeted the ocean and the room fell silent.  
  
  
*****  
  
Delany paced the room Clery had given her, fuming.  He had laughed her out of his study when she had told him she wanted to be a spy for him.  Actually laughed.  When she had tried to make her case, he had told her unequivocally that women were not used as spies; it was too dangerous, he said.  He didn’t trust her not to talk if captured.  She pointed out that she hadn’t talked when he’d had a knife at her throat, but he dismissed that.  “There are too many men who enjoy torturing women for information,” he’d said.  “You start losing pieces of your fingers, or get an unwanted cock between your legs, you’d break soon enough.”  
  
She threw herself on the bed and stared up at the ceiling.  Of course there was no way of knowing how she would react to something like that; but there was no way for the men to know either until they were faced with it.  The trick, it seemed to her, was not to get caught in the first place.    
  
An idea flitted through her head.  She sat up, trying to follow it.  Going to the small desk, she grabbed a pen and jotted down some notes.  She spent an hour perfecting it, sketching out different scenarios and possibilities, coming up with answers for every contingency.  Finally, when she was done, she memorized the paper before throwing it in the fire.    
  
Laying back on her bed, she smiled in wicked satisfaction.  One of her rare days off was coming up, and she knew how she was going to be spending it.  
  
*****  
  
Just as dawn’s first light was breaking through the windows, Aedion drifted awake, warm and comfortable.  He blinked at the unfamiliar surroundings and tried to roll over.  A hard band across his chest tightened, trapping him against a blatantly male body and he began thrashing in panic.  It released almost instantly and he threw himself out of bed and spun around, crouched and snarling, ready to attack.    
  
Mikkal was kneeling on the bed, startled, staring around the still-dark room looking for the source of danger, his dagger somehow already in his hand.  As he found nothing amiss, he sheathed his knife and dropped it on the bed then held his hands up, palms out.   “It’s just me, Aedion.  It’s just me,” he said in a low voice.  Aedion shuddered and let himself fall onto his ass on the floor, rubbing a hand through his shaggy hair.    
  
A light flared; Mikkal had lit the lamp.  Not looking at him, Aedion pushed to his feet and stumbled into the bathing room.  There was a mild surge of nausea but he was able to swallow it back.  He took care of business, then leaned against the wall, rubbing his eyes, trying to ignore the pain he felt in his chest.  
  
The door opened and Mikkal walked in without preamble.  “I’m in here,” Aedion snarled.  
  
“Obviously,” Mikkal said, unfazed, leaning against the wall next to him.  Aedion closed his eyes, not able to look at that level amber stare, at his tousled black hair that somehow made him more beautiful.  Wanting to touch him, but not able to close the few inches of distance between them. They stood there in silence for a while, listening to the quiet sounds of inn staff beginning their day.     
  
“I understand now,” Aedion said abruptly.  
  
“Understand what?”  
  
“Why you…don’t want to be with me.”  
  
He heard movement, and opened his eyes to see Mikkal directly in front of him, a hand pressed to the wall on either side of him, looking up through his lashes.  “Is that what you got out of our conversation last night?” he breathed.  “You think I don’t want to be with you?”  Aedion shrugged, trying to avoid his gaze.  “I want you so much I can barely concentrate.  I couldn’t trust myself last night, Aedion, it wasn’t…”  He blew out a frustrated breath.  “Do you think of me like you think of the women you bed in town?”  
  
Startled, Aedion looked straight into his eyes.  “Of course not.”  
  
Mikkal brushed his cheekbone gently.  “You’re not some lay for me.  And I refuse to treat you like one.”  He stepped in closer, pressing their bodies together.  Aedion’s hand found its way to the small of Mikkal’s back, and he bent his head the couple of inches needed to brush lips once before pulling back a fraction.  
  
“So it’s not because I have these…episodes?”  
  
“Now that I know you’re not going to drop dead on me during one?”  He smiled faintly.  “As long as you don’t break my neck, you can do whatever you need to.  But I’d rather not trigger one if I can help it.  You deserve better than that.”   
  
The stabbing pain Aedion had been feeling in his heart dissipated.  One corner of his mouth lifted.  “I seem to remember you telling me something else last night.”  
  
“Oh?”  Mikkal arched an eyebrow and a slow smile began to spread.  
  
Aedion nodded slightly, the movement brushing his lips against the face so close to his.  “When are you going to make good on that promise?”  
  
Mikkal chuckled.  “If you want that, we best get going.  We’ve got a full day’s work to do before I can devote a proper amount of time to you.”  
  
*****  
  
Eighteen hours later, Aedion lay flat on his back, feeling as if every bone in his body had turned into mush.  Mikkal was stretched out next to him, head propped up on one hand, looking rather pleased with himself.  As well he should.  Aedion had to admit he’d been a bit naive after all.  It had never occurred to him how much pleasure he could receive from another man’s hands, how being stroked would feel both familiar and so, so different.  Mikkal had brought him to the edge of release and then back down several times, until he’d been almost in agony from it.  When Mikkal had taken him into his mouth, he had honestly thought he would die from the shock and sheer pleasure of it.    
  
And now here he was, unable to move, with that beautiful man next to him.  He would have to return the favor, as soon as his limbs started functioning again.  Mikkal’s free hand was tracing over his abdomen, following the tracks of the muscles.  In his current state, even that light touch was almost too much stimulation.    
  
“How many lovers have you had?” he asked abruptly, trying to keep the smile out of his voice.  
  
Mikkal paused, looking a little embarrassed.  “Why the hell do you want to know that?” he asked, disconcerted.  
  
“I’m just trying to figure out how many thank-you notes I need to write.”  
  
A shocked laugh burst out of Mikkal’s mouth.  He bent down to kiss him, and Aedion regained enough strength in his limbs to wrap his arms around him and pull him on top of him.  He loved feeling his weight, the solidness of him.  Loved the arousal he could feel pressing against his abdomen.   With a low growl, he flipped them over, eliciting another laugh from Mikkal.  “Your turn,” he said, sliding his hand down to tease at him.  “But you’re going to need to teach me.”  
  
“Well,” Mikkal replied, a little breathlessly, “I think I can manage that.”  
  
*****  
  
Mikkal awoke, back pressed against a large, warm body, held close by an arm wrapped around his ribs.  They had kicked the covers off sometime in the night, when even the open windows couldn’t catch enough breeze to cool the room for easy sleeping.  He looked down in the dim light of morning at his legs tangled with Aedion’s, only the contrast between the olive of his own skin and the fairness of the other’s differentiating them.  Gentle lips pressed against his neck, and he arched into them as the broad hand holding him began traveling down his body.  
  
*****  
  
It was early morning when Delaney slipped out of the house and waited by the corner.  Kerrin was in with Clery now, but should be heading out on his morning’s task at any moment.  Sure enough, only a few minutes passed before the small man in his grubby coat departed from the side door and walked past her.  When he had gone a reasonable distance, she began to follow him, sliding unnoticed between other city-dwellers, occasionally cutting through small shops.  He reached his destination, a large fine house - one of the handsomest in the entire city - on the same block as the abandoned castle.  There he found a low wall to sit on and pulled out a newspaper.  She ducked into a small coffeeshop across the street where she could see both the house and Kerrin, and ordered herself a small pastry.  Sitting by the window, she nibbled on her pastry while she jotted some notes down on a piece of paper.    
  
Eventually a carriage came down the drive, and Kerrin stood up, back turned to the house, fussing with his newspaper.  The carriage turned right and began heading up the street, and as he began to follow it Delaney left her coffeeshop and trailed him into the busiest part of town.  The carriage was stopped at a nondescript office she had brought letters to herself before, only the driver standing waiting at the horses’ heads and the footman sitting on the running board.  Kerrin stopped at a stand selling meat pies, and she slipped into a flower shop nearby.  A couple of coppers bought her a small bouquet, and she waited in the doorway watching Kerrin’s back as he ate his pie.    
  
Two men emerged from the office and were helped into the carriage by the footman while the driver returned to is perch.  One of the men was Darrow; she didn’t recognize the other but quickly noted he had auburn hair and a small beard, and appeared to be in his early twenties.  The driver called out to the horses and they began to move.  Kerrin hastily finished his pie and doffed his hat as he began following once again, Delaney again behind him, sniffing happily at her flowers.    
  
This continued at two more stops around the city before the carriage returned to the original house.  Once the carriage was safely up the drive, Kerrin turned to head back to Clery’s.  Delaney did the same, taking several of her favorite shortcuts up quiet alleys and through busy shops.  When she got to the house, neither Clery nor Kerrin were anywhere to be seen.  She hastily completed her notes about where Darrow and Kerrin had been and what they had done, sealed the paper, and dropped it with one of her flowers on Clery’s desk before retreating to her room just as Kerrin returned and sat waiting in the downstairs parlor.  
  
She heard Clery return, and the two men retire to his study, then the low murmur of voices that went on for hours.  It was late in the evening when there was a knock on her door and Clery entered.  He held up the letter and the wilting flower.  “What is all this?” he asked.  
  
“You said that you don’t trust me not to talk if I get caught.  But what if I don’t get caught?”   
  
He shook his head.  “Delaney, it’s just not safe for you.”  
  
“It’s not safe for anyone,” she replied, exasperated.  “Neither was growing up in a war camp run by a man like General Perrington.  Neither was traveling up here by myself.  You can’t know that any of your people are going to hold up if they get caught.”  
  
“If they catch you, they will hurt you.”  
  
She swallowed a laugh.  “If they catch me, they will kill me, Clery.  Don’t think I don’t know that.”  They glared at each other for a moment before she asked, “Did Kerrin even know I was there?”  
  
He shook his head and sagged a little, and she felt him weakening.  “No, but he wasn’t looking for you.”  
  
She shrugged elaborately and decided not to comment that was kind of the point of being a spy.  “And that’s why I’m suitable.  Nobody expects me to be a spy.  Nobody is looking for someone like me, I’m utterly ordinary.”   
  
Clery looked at her with his lips pressed together, considering.  “You may blend in well, missy, but you’re hardly ordinary.  All right.  I’ll begin training you, but I can’t promise I’ll actually assign you anything.”  
   
Delaney grinned, holding out her hand.  After a moment’s hesitation, Clery shook it, muttering something that sounded like, “May the gods help us all.”  
  
*****  
  
The planning of the scouting mission went better than Mikkal could have predicted.  Aedion was a genius in the woods, and Mikkal learned more in the two days they were out there than he had in his entire life.  The first change to his plans was made when Aedion insisted that the horses be left behind, as in general the scouting in Adarlan was done largely on horseback.  Aedion pointed out that a large noisy animal was not particularly suited for stealth.  It worked on the plains that made up much of the eastern half of the country because you could blend in with other riders and see a longer distance on a horse, but in the woods it simply alerted anyone and everyone to your presence.    
  
They decided to send groups of no more than four people per day to scout two “runners,” of which Aedion himself would be one so he could help critique.  Mikkal would observe what he could on the ground.  They would limit the runners to a three mile radius to make it easier.  Each group of scouts would consist of one lieutenant and two or three regulars, and they would have to decide on a plan and execute it on their own.  The lieutenants would have a month to plan and select their scouts.  
  
The ride back to camp was rather more subdued than the ride out.  They talked a bit about their plans, and which lieutenants would be selected; they had a week to run the exercise, which meant about only about a quarter of the lieutenants at camp would have a chance.  But mostly, Mikkal thought about what would happen between them now.    
  
They hadn’t taken that final step.  He knew that Aedion wasn’t ready, and besides, they were pleasing each other enough as it was.  It hurt him a little to know he was going to be back to an empty bed; even though they had only had three nights together, and one of them a bit fraught, he loved having that warm solidness next to him.    
  
Evidently Aedion’s mind was traveling similar roads.  “Would your mother really disapprove of me?” he asked, seemingly at random.  
  
‘No,” Mikkal smiled at him, “she’d love you.  Hell, she already does love you, since you’ve run so many errands for you.  No, she’d be disappointed in me.”  
  
“Why?”  
  
“Well, unless you can use your fae powers to grow a womb, she’d be quite unhappy at the lack of grandchildren.”  
  
Aedion laughed.  “Come, now, we’d make beautiful babies,” he said, grinning at him crookedly.  
  
“Only if they took after you.”  
  
*****  
  
They arrived just as the general was walking across the square.  Aedion glanced at Mikkal.  “Here, let me take him to the stables,” he said, reaching a hand out to take Chetak’s reins.  Mikkal swung off and with a quick thanks followed after his father, who had paused on the steps in front of the house.  He bowed on reaching the steps, and his father pulled him into a quick hug as they walked into the house and straight into the study.  
  
“Well,” the general said as he poured a brandy for each of them, “I see the young lieutenant didn’t eat you alive on your trip.”  
  
Mikkal laughed.  “I told you, I don’t have anything to fear from Ashryver.”  It felt strange to call him by his surname again, but he needed to get back in the habit.   
  
His father grunted.  “Did you settle on a plan for the training?”  Mikkal launched into it, going in detail through what Aedion had explained about moving within Oakwald, seeing without being seen, and how best to get the soldiers on board.  The general approved of the roughout and leaned back in his chair.  “You know, we’ve been underutilizing Oakwald.  I’ve been running this camp for twenty years now, and we’ve seldom trained in it.  Actually we were ordered to keep out of it for the most part.”  
  
“I wonder why?”  
  
“I imagine it had something to do with its former occupants.”  
  
Mikkal shuddered to think of the wholesale slaughter of fae that had taken place.  He hadn’t been involved in it, but he recalled seeing - and smelling - the pyres during one of his many trips around the country.  In six months, every single fae in the country had been destroyed.  He wondered how it had been managed, given what he’d observed of Aedion’s speed and strength.  If he was only a tiny fraction fae…  “How did we manage it?”  His father looked blank.   Eliminating the fae, I mean.”  
  
“Once magic disappeared it was not that difficult, from what I understand,” his father replied with a shrug.  “Plus the King has some people hand-picked for just such work.”     
  
The King.  The King had prepared a group of people to destroy an entire race in a matter of months.  After the rulers of Terrasen had been conveniently assassinated, and after somehow, also conveniently, magic had disappeared.  Then the orders had come down even in Fenharrow to kill the magically-gifted healers… He felt like he was going to vomit.  “If you’ll excuse me, Father, I think I’ll say hello to Mother.”  He started to rise.  
  
“Don’t go down that road, son,” his father said, watching him, a sure knowledge on that grizzled face.  “You serve the King.  You took an oath, one you were proud to take.  Don’t throw that away because of that boy.”  
  
Mikkal froze.  “What?”  
  
The general smiled a bit sadly at him.  “I’m not stupid, son.  I’ve seen the way Ashryver looks at you, and I can understand why you’d be drawn to him.  But don’t let that ruin a promising career.”  
  
Sinking back into his chair, Mikkal crossed his arms and looked at his father.  There was no use denying it, not at this point.  “Ashryver’s not the issue, Father,” he finally said.  “I’m just coming to wonder what the King’s goals are.”  
  
“That’s not for us to question.  We took an oath to serve, son, and we will honor that oath.”  
  
This was what made his father a great general, Mikkal thought, studying the set of his jaw, the calm resolution in his eyes.  He was a rock on which opposing voices would be dashed, seeming so solid in his belief that he would not be swayed.  “Don’t you ever…chafe?” Mikkal asked.  “Don’t you ever hear an order, even one not given to you, and think that it’s just wrong?”  
  
“No, son, I don’t.  I have faith that the King knows what is best for this country, and I am merely a blade.”  He said it with gentle conviction, but Mikkal could read the lie in his eyes, the flicker of pain of past wrongs done.  He wondered what haunted his father’s dreams; if he too saw the faces of those he’d killed, heard the dull thuds of arrows meeting bodies, felt the reverberation of swords embedding in flesh, smelled the iron tang of blood.  Without thinking, he ran his hand over his ribs, feeling the phantom pain of that dagger, remembering the solid knowledge of impending death that had increased with each painful gasp for breath.  
  
His father tracked the movement.  “Does that trouble you still?”  
  
He shook his head.  “No, not really.  Just…the memory hits sometimes.”    
  
The silence stretched between them, and finally he nodded at his father and rose.  As he reached the door, his father asked quietly, “Is he good to you?”  
  
Mikkal looked over his shoulder to see not a general, but a man worried about his son.  “Yes, Father, he is.  Better than I am to him, I think.”  
  
General Paget nodded, face expressionless.  “You do know that you’re going to be separated soon.”  
  
“What do you mean?”  He turned to face his father fully.  
  
“Your orders are bound to come through once the training is done.  I’m betting you’ll be sent back to Fenharrow, probably before winter hits.”  
  
Ugh.  He hated Fenharrow, hated the bugs and the heavy air and the fact that he never, ever felt dry.  Hated the way the people cringed away from everyone in military dress, how conversation stopped if he entered a tavern in his uniform, how the empty houses now outnumbered the occupied ones.  Hated the mass graves he’d helped create.  “Why do they always want me down there?  I’d been hoping I’d at least stay in Adarlan proper.”  
  
“You know why, son.”  He did.  With his complexion, he passed for a native; indeed, was often mistaken for one.  Not for the first time he wished he’d inherited more than height from his father.  
  
“And Ashryver will almost certainly stay here.”  The words struck like a blow, even though he’d known that was always the plan.  To have Aedion close to Terrasen, so they could begin using him against his own country.  But for them to be separated by all of Adarlan and more…His breath caught in his throat at the knife-sharp pain.  
  
His father was looking at him, a strange sort of sympathy on his face.  “You should tell your mother.”  
  
Mikkal knew what he meant.  He rubbed a hand along the back of his neck and sighed.  “I don’t want to break her heart.”  
  
“Better break her heart with honesty than with lies.  She deserves that at least.”  
  
After a long pause, Mikkal gave a short bow and left.  
  
*****  
  
Aedion waited in Mikkal’s rooms for him to return.  He’d enjoyed putting up the horses, joking around with the stable lads as he rubbed them down.  They had come to accept that if he had time he’d take care of Avenar himself, though they still took pride in having her gleaming whenever he stopped by.  Then he’d stopped at the kitchens and charmed some food out of the cook, who had chided him for being a beggar so close to the evening meal even as she’d served him a heaping portion of meat and vegetables.  Now he was here, having dumped his own pack off in his room.  Pacing around, he glanced at some of the books Mikkal had on his shelves.  Mostly unfamiliar titles, though he recognized a couple about strategy and one classic novel he’d been forced to read during his lessons in Orynth.  Pulling one he didn’t recognize down, he flipped through it; it was a history of music in Adarlan.  He lay down on the bed and started to read.  
  
There was a noise on the stairs and he looked up as Mikkal entered and half-slammed the door behind him, looking frazzled.  He pulled up short at the sight of Aedion lying on his bed, then kicked his boots off and sprawled out next to him without saying a word.  Aedion brushed his fingers lightly through Mikkal’s hair, and he smiled a little in response.  “How’d the meeting with your father go?” Aedion asked.  
  
“Fine,”  Mikkal muttered, smile disappearing.  Aedion said nothing, accepting the lie.  Setting the book down, he pulled Mikkal closer so the black head rested on his shoulder.  It had barely been twelve hours since he’d had Mikkal arching and crying out beneath his hands and mouth.  It felt like years.  He slid his hand under the back Mikkal’s shirt, craving the feel of skin and smooth muscle.  Lips met his throat, and he let out a low growl as he moved his hand south.    
  
Mikkal surged up to kiss him properly, those lean clever fingers flicking open the front of his pants and sliding in to grip him.  There was more urgency to the rhythm than there had been previously, and Aedion surrendered to him, pressing his head back and trying to stifle his moans as Mikkal slid down his body and took him in his mouth.  He surged with his hips as Mikkal ran his tongue over the head of him, barely able to hold back against the fine graze of teeth that followed.  His fingers tangled in that fine black hair, needing to hold onto something as his release shook him to the core.  
  
He tried to clear the spots from his vision as that long, lean body dragged up his own.  He bent down to kiss him, the taste of himself on that tongue almost enough to ready him again.  Fumbling with the buttons on Mikkal’s pants, he finally freed him, and they moaned into each other’s mouths as he wrapped his hand around that proud length.  Learning his preferences had been rather like coming home to a house that had all been rearranged; not like he still felt with women, as if he were exploring a foreign land.  Kneeling between Mikkal’s thighs, he soon had him writhing, bringing him to the brink before slowing.  He grinned as Mikkal panted, reaching for him, and he leaned forward to tease his tongue down his chest and clenched abdomen before sucking him into his mouth.  Mikkal cursed under his breath, breath that was coming in more fevered pants before he finally spasmed and went over the edge.    
  
Mikkal rolled onto his side, gasping, and Aedion crawled up behind him and wrapped one arm around him, pressing his face against the back of Mikkal’s neck.  He was half hard again already, which seemed utterly ridiculous, but what could he do?  His cock thought it had some clever ideas, but he ignored it.  He could still feel tension pouring off Mikkal, even as his body was limp in his arms.    
  
“What happened?” he asked quietly into Mikkal’s ear.    
  
“My father knows,” came the whispered reply.  He stiffened, and Mikkal added, “Not about you, but about…us.”  He turned in Aedion’s arms to face him, bringing up one hand to rest against his cheek.  Aedion closed his eyes, leaning into the touch.  
  
“Is that so bad?” he asked, keeping his eyes closed, not sure he wanted to see Mikkal’s expression.  
  
“No.  No, it’s not bad.  It’s just…”  Aedion waited, and after a few heartbeats Mikkal went on in a sudden rush of words.  “I don’t know what I’m doing anymore.  I hear your stories and I look around at what’s happened over the last three years, at what I’ve done, and I just don’t know.”   
  
Aedion didn’t know either, not what to say or do to make him feel better.  So he settled for holding him close and kissing his forehead, then his eyelids, then his nose.  When he finally tilted his face up to claim his mouth, Mikkal kissed him back with an intensity that bordered on desperation.  Somehow, it felt like the beginning of a good-bye.    
  
*****  
  
Clery was as good as his word.  Though Delaney had to admit that the training was not even remotely what she had expected.  She was to be apprenticed to a baker, then a seamstress, then a flower seller.  When she had questioned this, he had pointed out that since she was useless to him as a spy in Terrasen where her accent stuck out like a sore thumb, he needed her well-versed in different skills so she could be utilized in Adarlan.  A woman with a regular job would cause less suspicion and be less at risk.  At night, he worked with her on spotting a tail, on writing in code, and other useful little tidbits.    
  
Fulke had found out about her plans, only he knew how, and before he returned to Adarlan he insisted she be taught self-defense.  Aedion had taught her a couple of basic maneuvers primarily involving jabbing body parts into groins, which Fulke referred to as “dirty but effective” when she demonstrated them.  He spent a week teaching her how to break a hold, both from in front and behind; how to break a person’s nose with her palm and her head; how to kick in knees and sweep out ankles, and the power of an elbow to the stomach to bring a taller opponent down into range.  But mostly he emphasized running.  By the time he departed for who-knows-where, he declared her almost competent and ordered her to keep working.  Clery grudgingly agreed to help her continue her studies in that as well.    
  
By the end of the first week, she had decided she loved everything about baking except the heat of the ovens.  The master baker she was studying under, a large surly bald man referred to only as Ea, rarely spoke in more than grunts.  She soon got fluent in his chosen language, recognizing approval versus irritation versus caution.  Then there were the noises that started out deep and soared rapidly to a high-pitched squeak, which generally indicated she had committed some sort of terrifying baking sin that would result in utter catastrophe.  Fortunately those were few and far between, and she mostly got to enjoy the feel of dough kneading beneath her fingers, the smell of fresh-baked bread, the satisfaction of perfectly risen golden-brown cakes coming from the oven, and the joy of watching Ea frost said cakes into beautiful works of art.  Cake decoration was the one thing he always did himself, and he turned into a different person as he carefully piped glorious flowers and hand-made tiny birds and butterflies out of fondant.    
  
Watching him was a revelation.  She had never known anybody who loved creating like that,  who was truly happy in what they did.  Her entire life had been about survival, and she couldn’t help but wonder, what was she fighting so hard to survive for?  So she watched those thick fingers nimbly sculpt and tint and arrange, feeling a peace steal through her that was no less valuable for belonging to someone else.  And she realized…this was what they were all fighting for.  She, and Clery, and Fulke and Darrow, and somewhere in Adarlan her brother and Aedion, and countless people she didn’t know and couldn’t name.  Fighting so that in a small, sweet-smelling corner shop, a silent man would be able to continue to make edible art and smile at the children pressed against his shop windows.       
   
  



	11. Chapter 11

The long summer evening was finally deepening into dusk when Aedion found Mikkal at his usual table in the officer’s lounge, an empty tankard of ale next to him and his papers spread out.  He wasn’t alone, much to Aedion’s disappointment.  They hadn’t had time alone since the night they had returned a week ago, and now as usual the lounge was half-full of his fellow infant lieutenants.  The new camp assignments were due within the next couple of weeks, and the other men hovered around the captain as if he had some control over the orders from the King.  He bit back a snarl when Amond brought over a fresh drink; somehow he didn’t think Mikkal would appreciate the display.    
  
Flopping down in a chair next to Litton with his own tankard, he ignored Harcourt’s glare and propped his feet up on a spare seat.  The other men were in the midst of planning their trip into town the next day, which explained the venom in Harcourt’s eyes; he had been forbidden to set foot in the town after his appalling behavior.    
  
“You going to come see the singer?” Litton asked, and Aedion tilted his head at him in a silent question.  “At the meeting hall.”  Aedion continued to look at him blankly, and Litton laughed.  “You really are just a big brute, aren’t you.  There’s a concert tomorrow, the notices were up all over town last week.  I know it’ll delay your weekly fuck for a couple hours, but she’s supposed to be brilliant.”  
  
“Is she supposed to be pretty, too?” Aedion asked, furrowing his brow, and Litton shoved at his shoulder.  Aedion grinned.  “I’ll see if I can manage it.”   He drained his glass and stood.    
  
“Leaving so soon?  Well, that’s just pathetic,” Ilbert teased.  “I didn’t realize you were such a lightweight.”  Aedion paused for a heartbeat, then swept Ilbert up over his shoulder in a movement so swift nobody tracked it.  The other lieutenants roared with laughter as Ilbert tried uselessly to free himself.    
  
“Not sure I’m the one who counts as a lightweight, there, my friend,” Aedion said as he set a red-faced Ilbert back on his feet.  “Nah, I just wanted to check on Raedan.  It’s his first night doing solo watch in the tower, and I’m betting I can catch him falling asleep.”  
  
“Raedan Lamar?” Geary piped up.  “You’ll never catch that one sleeping.  I’m not even sure why we’re wasting our time training him to fight.”  
  
“What do you mean?” Litton asked, a bit concerned, and Aedion was grateful to him for the question.  
  
“He’s part of my crew,” Geary said.  “That boy…I swear he knows more about this camp than people who grew up here, and he only got transferred over what, two months ago?  I mean, he’s a decent fighter, but if Ivry doesn’t pick him for the scout training, he’s a fool.”  
  
Interesting.  Not surprising, given Delaney’s talents, but interesting that Geary had picked up on it too.  Aedion made a mental note to pay more attention to Geary in meetings.  With a few more jokes, he made his escape and headed to the kitchens.  Ducking through the low door, he saw Pipa just beginning to set her bread for the morning.    
  
“You’re early,” she said, accepting his kiss on the cheek.  As soon as the kitchen staff had realized that he needed to eat more - and he wasn’t sure if Mikkal had said something or if it was simply because he began showing up several times during the day - they had begun setting aside extra food for him after each meal.  He sat on his usual chair and pulled the covered plate towards him, tucking into the pile of roast chicken and accompanying vegetables.  
  
“My friend is on tower duty for the first time,” he said with a grin.  “I thought I’d keep him company for a bit.”  
  
“Ah, aren’t you sweet,” she said, beaming at him.  “You’ll want to bring him some coffee and a rusk, then.”  Bustling off before he could respond, she returned moments later with a flask of coffee and a small wax-paper package.  He finished his meal and she shooed him off, turning back to her bread and barking orders at her young helper.  
  
He climbed the stairs up the tower Raedan had been assigned to, throwing open the door dramatically and bouncing into the room.  Raedan was as startled as he’d hoped for, leaping up and reaching for his fighting knives before the identity of his visitor registered.    
  
“For Hellas’s sake, Aedion,” he snapped, then started to laugh.    
  
“Evening, my brother,” Aedion replied.  “How’s your first night going?”  
  
“Well, the first half-hour went fine,” Raedan said, grinning, “but then a giant burst in and now I’m fearing for my life.”  
  
“As well you should,” Aedion admonished.  “I’ve come to kill you with coffee and bread, courtesy of Pipa in the kitchen.”  He handed over the flask and the wrapped parcel.    
  
“Excellent.”  Raedan tucked both under his bench and turned his eyes back out his window with an apologetic shrug.  They chatted for a while, Raedan filling him in on his training and the general camp gossip.  Evidently there were quite a few romances going on between soldiers and the younger set of women employed at camp.  And Geary was apparently wooing a young lady in town, much to Raedan’s - and Aedion’s - mocking delight.    
  
Aedion sat on the floor of the tower, enjoying the ebb and flow of the conversation.  Though they still ate together regularly, there were always enough people around that their natural banter was subdued.  It made him miss Raedan’s sisters, all three of them.  He wondered again if Delaney had ever made it to Terrasen, had ever found Darrow.  He cringed a little internally when he thought of how little information he’d left her with, though if anyone could turn a few fragments of information and a map into gold it would be her.  Avis and Maida, though…they were still so young.  He hadn’t dared write to them, not wanting anyone at Perrington’s camp to realize how much he cared about them.  He knew Raedan would have told him if he’d heard anything, and the lack of news worried him.    
  
An abrupt silence made him look up, thinking Raedan had spotted something out the tower window.  Instead he found those gray-green eyes on him and wondered what part of the conversation he’d missed.  He rubbed his hand through his hair.  “Sorry, I’m just missing your sisters.”  
  
Raedan blinked, surprised enough that it was obvious his thoughts were trending in a different direction.  “Me too,” he said quietly, turning his attention back outside.  “I miss all of us being together.”    
  
They sat in silence for a bit, each in their own thoughts, before Aedion remembered to ask, “What were you saying before?”  
  
Every one of Raedan’s muscles went tight, though he didn’t look at him, and Aedion steeled himself.  “I was just wondering if you and Captain Paget were…together.”  
  
Aedion waited a beat too long before answering, the hesitation an answer in itself.  “Is that what camp gossip is saying?” he asked, striving for lightness.  
  
“Not that I’ve heard,” was the quiet reply.  “I just noticed that you seem to spend a lot of time together even when you don’t have to.  And then I remembered when he was watching you, back at the inn, and what you said, and I just kind of realized.”  
  
Well, shit.  Though the general evidently knew, he didn’t think Mikkal wanted it public.  Honestly, he didn’t know if he wanted it public, though the reason behind that eluded him.  But this was Raedan.  He took a deep breath.  “We’ve been…getting closer, I guess you could say.”    
  
“So that’s why you two went away together.”  
  
“No,” he said carefully, trying to figure out the undercurrent of resentment he could sense.  “We went away together to plan for the scout training.   You know that.”  
  
“Right.  Planning, fucking, it’s all a good time.  Well I guess that explains it,” Raedan said flatly.  
  
“Explains what?”  
  
“Why you never fell in love with Delaney.”  
  
Aedion’s temper began to flare, and he took some deep breaths to try to bank it.  “Your sister was less interested in me than I was in her, actually.”     
  
Raedan snorted contemptuously.  “Sure.”  Aedion ground his teeth.  He was not going to rip Raedan’s head off.  He wouldn’t.      
  
“I’m not sure what your problem is, exactly.”  
  
Raedan shrugged, still keeping his eyes trained out the window.  Aedion could feel the muscle in his jaw start to spasm and before he could say something he’d regret he stood up.  
  
“Have a pleasant watch, Raedan,” he said, and turned to leave.  
  
The door was closing behind him when he heard him say, anger and something else coloring his voice, “I just don’t understand how you can stand it.”  
  
He shouldered back through to see Raedan on his feet, facing him.  “Stand what?”  
  
“Letting him fuck you, after what they did.”  He shook his head.  “I saw what they did to you, Aedion, and it broke you.  And now, another officer is treating you like a whore –“  
  
“You don’t get to do this, Raedan,” Aedion snarled, taking a couple steps towards him.  He was both pleased and disgusted by the whiff of fear that came off of his friend.  “You don’t get to judge me.  They tried to break me, yes-“  
  
“Tried to?” Raedan nearly yelled, face mottled purple, fists clenched.  His breath hitched, and he lowered his voice.  “No, they broke you, Aedion.  I was there afterwards, in case you forgot.“  
  
“They. Did. Not. Break. Me.”  The growl lacing his voice was enough of a threat that Raedan took an involuntary step back before setting his feet again.  
  
“Does he know?” Raedan was still seething.  Still scornful.  “Does Captain Paget know what they did to you?”    
  
Aedion straightened up.  The memory of Mikkal holding him, listening to his story with no judgment, no intolerable pity, flashed through him.  “Yes, he does.  I told him everything.”   
  
Raedan paused, taken aback, but only for a second.  “Then if he can picture you covered in blood and rope burns and gods knows what else, and he can still -”  
  
“Do not finish that sentence.”  Aedion ordered coldly.  “You have no right to dictate who I fall in love with -”  
  
“You think you’re in love with him?”  Raedan interrupted, voice soaring.  “Are you mad?”  
  
Aedion’s breath caught painfully as he looked at his friend, his brother in all but blood, fuming before him.  He could see that same face laughing with him over meals; tight with concern as he vomited after dropping Balam; full of joy and proud duty when they left Perrington’s camp together.  His eyes started to burn, and he turned towards the stairs.  Looking over his shoulder, he murmured, “You should get back to your watch,” before walking out, letting the door click shut behind him.   
  
*****  
  
The lounge had emptied before Mikkal finished his weekly reports and cleaned up his mess.  He was still inclined to laugh at how easily Aedion had confirmed his status at the top of the lieutenant class, while seeming to just be joking around.  It was impossible to tell if it was deliberate or just instinctive.    
  
Either way, Mikkal wanted to find him and feel that strength for himself.  It had been too long already.  
  
He checked the kitchens, but they were dark and empty.  The stables, too, were quiet except for the steady grind of horses chewing.  Aedion had said he was going to visit his friend in one of the watch towers, but he didn’t want to go look for him for fear of eliciting too many questions.  With a frustrated sigh, he started back towards his rooms when he saw a familiar figure materialize out of the shadows near the dining hall, heading towards the stables Mikkal had just left.  Turning on his heel, Mikkal headed towards him.  
  
Aedion must have seen or heard him, because he paused.  “I just wanted to find out if you’re planning on going into town tomorrow,” Mikkal said by way of greeting.    
  
“Is that a joke?” Aedion snapped.  “Sometimes you can be a real prick, Mikkal.”  
  
Utterly taken aback, Mikkal really looked at him, noticing the clenched fists, the tightness of those broad shoulders, the way he wouldn’t meet his eye.  “You’re in a fine mood tonight,” he observed drily, wondering what had happened.    
  
“Do you really think I want to go fuck some woman?”  
  
Fighting back an unholy desire to laugh, he replied, “Well, if you wanted to I wouldn’t try to stop you.”  Aedion took a step towards him with a snarl, but Mikkal held his ground.  Blazing turquoise eyes met cool amber ones, and Mikkal arched a brow.  “I take it that’s a no, then?”  When there was no answer, he went on.  “Gods, Aedion, maybe I’m an arrogant bastard, but that honestly never even crossed my mind.  I was thinking about the concert, that if you wanted to go I’d love to go with you.”  All the fight dropped out of  that big frame, though the tension remained, and Mikkal moved in closer, so they were nearly touching.  “And maybe spend the night, if you like, or we could come back here.”  
  
Aedion turned and started to walk towards the stable, muttering, “I’ll think about it.”  
  
“Ashryver.”  The name was a command, and Aedion stopped.  “Come with me.”  Mikkal headed back to the vacant lounge, ignoring the huff of aggravation behind him since it was accompanied by footsteps.  Once inside, he shut the door, tossed his papers on his usual table, and lit a lamp before facing Aedion.  He was standing by the door staring across the room, arms crossed, lips pressed tight.  Mikkal leaned back against the table and waited.  
  
After several long minutes, Aedion finally looked him in the face.  “What.”  
  
“I just wanted to find out what happened after you left here earlier.”    
  
Aedion blew out a humorless laugh and began pacing.  His feet eventually carried him to Mikkal’s table, and he stopped in front of him, though he looked at the floor rather than his face.  “Why do you want to be with me?”  
  
“What do you mean?” Mikkal asked, baffled.  
  
Gesturing vaguely towards the door, Aedion went on hoarsely.  “After everything you know about me, why do you still want me?”  He didn’t allow Mikkal to formulate a reply.  “Why do you want someone so…broken?”  
  
Mikkal felt like that Fenharrow dagger had slipped through his ribs again.  “You are not broken, Aedion,” he said in little more than a whisper, unable to find more volume.  Aedion just shook his head.  Mikkal cleared his throat and tried again.  “You’re not.  You’re a little…damaged, maybe, but so am I.”  Aedion still said nothing, keeping his eyes trained on the floor.  Mikkal reached up and cupped his jaw, forcing him to look at him.  “Tell me what happened tonight.”  
  
Pulling out of his grasp, Aedion prowled over to the bar and grabbed a bottle at random, popping off the cap and swigging straight from it.  Grimacing and coughing, he glared at the label and set it back on the counter, keeping his back to Mikkal.  “Raedan knows about us.”  Mikkal made an indistinct noise of acknowledgement.  “He was less than supportive.”    
  
That explains it, Mikkal thought.  He didn’t know the young recruit well, but Aedion’s friendship with him was obviously strong.  A suspicion as to the nature of Lamar’s objection stole through him.  “What exactly troubled him?” he asked, keeping his voice neutral.  
  
“Raedan was the one who took care of me.  After.”    
  
Oh.  Not quite what Mikkal was expecting him to say, though it explained their closeness.  When nothing else was forthcoming, he spoke.  “And he doesn’t think you would be with me by choice.”  The silence was eloquent.  “Damn.”  
  
“It doesn’t help that he still doesn’t understand why Delaney and I didn’t end up together.”  
  
Mikkal’s head was starting to swim.  “Who’s Delaney?”  
  
“Raedan’s sister.”  Double damn.  “She’s probably the best friend I’ve made in Adarlan.”  Another verbal knife stabbed into Mikkal’s chest and twisted.  “I sent her away, though.”  
  
“Why?”  And why haven’t you told me about her before? he added silently.  
  
“Because those bastards knew about her.”  That was reason enough.  Mikkal was too well aware of the tactics employed by some of his fellow officers to question Aedion’s judgment on that matter.  He pushed off the table and moved to stand next to Aedion, resting his back against the bar.  
  
“Look, Aedion…”  He touched the hand pressing into the bar top next to him lightly with one finger.  “If you set aside all the rest of the bullshit, what do you want?  Do you want to be with me?  Because that’s my only question right now.”  When minutes ticked by without an answer, he left.  Out in the courtyard, he looked back to see the light in the lounge go out, but the door did not open and Aedion did not come after him.  
  
*****  
  
 Aedion paced the lounge in the dark, until the walls were closing in on him so much he fled into the open air.  Out in the camp, he just kept walking, not really paying attention to where he was going.  All he could see was the hatred in Raedan’s face when he asked how Aedion could stand it, all he could hear was the disdain in his voice echoing over and over.  “They broke you.”  Broke you.  Broke you.  He wanted to scream.  
  
Abruptly he changed direction and headed for the pitch.  Setting himself up opposite one of the targets, he pulled his knives out of the strap across his chest and threw them, one, two, three, clustering them in the center of the target.  Pulling them free, he paced back an additional ten steps and threw them again.  And again.  And again.  Feeling the cool metal in his hand, the balance of the swing of his arm, hearing the thud as the blade sank in.  Even in the dark, he didn’t falter, didn’t miss.  Didn’t stop, until the target was starting to fray and the knives would’t stick anymore.  By then, Mikkal’s voice was starting to counter Raedan’s.  “You’re not broken.”  “They broke you.”  “You’re not broken.”  He didn’t know who to believe.    
  
As dawn was approaching, he finally dropped into bed to catch a couple of hours of restless sleep.  Each time he woke, he thought of Mikkal singing to him, feeling the reverberation of the song echoing in his own chest as they pressed against each other.  And he wondered what damage Mikkal was alluding to when he talked about himself.  
  
Raedan was in the officer’s dining room, looking a bit wan, when he entered for breakfast, making his report to Geary as were the other night watchmen.  Aedion ignored him as he heaped eggs, steak, sausage, and mushrooms onto his plate and went to sit down.  Major Gall looked him up and down as he pulled out his chair.  
  
“Gods, Ashryver, you look like you got dragged through Hellas’s realm backwards.”    
  
He felt Raedan’s eyes flick to him.  Grinning at Gall, he drawled, “Why, Major, you’re making me blush.”  Gall chuckled and then grew serious.  
  
“You should take the whole day off, Lieutenant.  You’ve been pushing yourself awfully damn hard, between your training and working on the scout project.”  
  
“Thank you for the offer, Major, but I want to see how my men are doing with the crossbows.  Last week wasn’t so good.”  Mikkal walked in then, just as Raedan was leaving.  They both stopped, glaring at each other, then Raedan gave a small bow and slipped through the door.  
  
“Hmph.  You should at least take the afternoon off, go into town with the others.”  
  
“Yes, sir,” Aedion replied, not looking at Mikkal but speaking loudly enough to ensure he heard.  “It’s my understanding there’s a concert tonight that I should like to attend.”  Major Gall encouraged that plan, and Aedion finished his breakfast as quickly as he could.  
  
It was with some trepidation that he entered the stable to saddle Avenar that evening.  Litton was in there readying his stallion, and a number of the other officers’ horses were being prepped by stable boys.  He was pleased to see Chetak among them.  Sure enough, Mikkal appeared just as he was leading Avenar out, and they rode into town side by side, uncharacteristically quiet among the chattering men.    
  
They stabled their horses at the inn, then headed into the town square where the concert was being held.  There was a temporary stage at one end graced with only a chair and a large harp, and as they sat down next to each other the singer walked onto stage.  She was perhaps forty, still beautiful, with thick red hair nearly to her waist.  Seating herself by the harp, her fingers began playing over the strings.  The melody alone was entrancing.  And then she opened her mouth and began to sing.      
  
It was like nothing Aedion had ever heard before, yet it was also achingly familiar.  It took nearly until the end of the song that he realized it was one of the poems he had grown up with set to music.  Her rich, expressive voice and the background of harp brought new meaning to the long-remembered words about a brave warrior lost at sea, and he found himself blinking back tears.  Mikkal’s fingers brushed lightly against the back of his hand, and he trapped them with his own.  The first song came to a close, flowing directly into the second, and he was startled to hear the melody of the traditional song of mourning.  The lyrics were different, a sweet, simple tale of a maiden that he stopped following after a just a verse.  Instead, he allowed the music he had last heard in the days after he had lost everything to flow over him, through him, lancing his festering wounds.  Glancing at Mikkal, he saw tears running unashamedly down his cheeks, and he wondered again what - or who - haunted him.  
  
When the musician finally played her last poignant note two hours later, the applause was long and loud.  She bowed gracefully before sweeping off the stage.  Aedion rose slowly, almost reluctantly, wishing that the spell the singer had woven had not been broken.  He followed Mikkal out of the square.    
  
“Do you want to go home?” Mikkal murmured once they were clear of the bulk of the crowd.  Aedion almost answered yes before he realized Mikkal was not talking about Terrasen.    
  
“I don’t care where we go,” he said, “as long as we can be alone.”    
  
A slow smile spread across Mikkal’s face as he turned and headed into the inn.  Aedion secured a room while Mikkal waited in the stairwell.  They had barely gotten into the room when Mikkal turned and practically slammed Aedion against the door with a kiss like a brand.  Aedion had forgotten this side of him, after the gentle patience he had shown the week before.  He submitted for a few glorious moments before his own need surged and he pushed back off the door, spinning Mikkal around until he was pressed against the wall.  He needed skin under his hands and he started to pull at Mikkal’s shirt, nearly tearing it before Mikkal shoved him off, ripped off his jacket and yanked the shirt over his head.  Aedion followed suit, and then he had that long, muscular body in his arms, that tongue in his mouth, and he started to lose all reason.  
  
Pulling away from Mikkal’s mouth, he ran his tongue up the column of his throat, nipping when he reached his jaw, grinning at the sudden intake of breath he elicited.  Mikkal’s hands tugged at his waistband, dipping beneath before they moved to unbutton his pants and slide in.  Aedion’s breath caught as a hand wrapped around him, and he mirrored the action.  It wasn’t enough.    
  
Mikkal must have been thinking along similar lines.  Aedion allowed himself to be pushed back across the floor until his legs hit the bed and his body toppled backwards, dragging Mikkal with him.  Mikkal gave a low laugh and crawled up his body to meet his lips again.  They grappled with the rest of each other’s clothing, unwilling to break apart long enough to facilitate its removal, until finally Mikkal gave up and pulled away just long enough to roughly strip them both.  Aedion sat up and grabbed Mikkal, yanking him back down to the bed and rolling half on top of him, joining their mouths again.  He wanted to be everywhere at once, thought he was going to go mad from Mikkal’s fingers digging into his back and thigh, from the feel of his cock pressing against that sweat-slick body.  His hips surged of their own accord, and though he moaned into Mikkal’s mouth at the friction it still wasn’t enough.   
  
When they finally paused, panting, Mikkal whispered against his neck, “Gods, Aedion, I want you inside me.”  Aedion froze, unable to even take a breath. “Shit, I’m…” Mikkal stammered, detaching his hand from Aedion’s leg to cup his jaw.  “I don’t…you don’t…you don’t need to do anything you’re not -”  The rest of his sentence was lost against Aedion’s mouth.  
  
*****  
       
Mikkal lay flat on his back, staring at the ceiling, listening to Aedion breathing evenly next to him.  He wasn’t sure he could have moved even if he wanted to.  Every muscle was as limp as a wrung-out dishrag.  With a supreme effort, he turned his head to look at Aedion, at the big frame just beginning to fill out to its potential.  He needed to eat, they both did, but Mikkal was gods-damned if he was going to disturb him now.  
  
His hand strayed up to his shoulder, touching the bruise Aedion’s teeth had left.  It was fitting that he had been visibly marked.  Aedion may not have been experienced, but holy gods. Despite his exhaustion, he couldn’t stop replaying it in his mind.   The feel of Aedion driving deep within him, the hitches of breath, that arm around his chest hauling him upright, teeth burying in his shoulder as the broad hand palmed him, the twin roars of their releases…Then the gentle kisses afterwards, brushing Aedion’s golden hair back off his forehead, the sense of peace stealing over them both.  It was the difference between fucking and making love.   
  
And he was going to have to leave.  
  
The order had not come down yet, but he knew it would.  Word had arrived earlier that day that fighting was resuming in Fenharrow, a small but well-organized group resurgent against the might of Adarlan.  Part of him wasn’t even sure what side he wanted to fight on, or if he still wanted to fight at all.     
    
Aedion didn’t know that he sometimes wished that dagger had sunk a little deeper or the healer had been a little slower.  Nobody did.  He was too good at pretending that he didn’t still see their faces, the light going out of eyes just like his mother’s, like his own, thanks to his blade.  Too good at acting like he didn’t wake up nearly every night with the stench of shit and blood and terror in his nose, the sound of whips cracking into innocent flesh ringing in his ears.   
  
He rolled onto his side to face Aedion, still sound asleep.  “I don’t want to leave you,” he whispered.  “I want to take you away from all this bloodshed.  I want to find a place where we can just live in peace.”  _I love you_ , he thought, but he couldn’t say it aloud, even in a whisper.  
  
*****  
  
Aedion sat up in the tree, breathing in the familiar scents of Oakwald in late summer.  On the ground below, the first group of soldiers were creeping through the woods, trying to track him and Osment.  That soldier had been chosen for the task because he had grown up in the area and knew this part of the forest like the back of his hand.  Even Aedion wasn’t totally sure where Osment had hidden at the moment, though he knew roughly where he had been sent.  Of course, if he could keep his mind on his task and stop thinking about waking up tangled with Mikkal it might help.  They had spent nearly every night for the past month together, and he still couldn’t get enough.  If anything, his need had grown rather than been sated.  
  
He was the only lieutenant who had remained in Paget’s camp.  Everyone else had been scattered throughout the realm.  Litton had been sent to Breiner, and had departed with a note from Aedion to the warlord just a few days ago.  Harcourt was going to Noll, about as far away as possible, which also pleased him.  And though he knew he only stayed because they were going to use him to push into Terrasen, still he was grateful.   
  
A bird called, well to the north, drawing his attention back to the situation at hand.  A bird that didn’t belong in these woods, that lived only in northeastern Terrasen.   Aedion began moving, drawn to the sound.  The trees grew close enough that he was able to travel from branch to branch for quite some time, though Mikkal would’ve had an apoplectic fit if he had seen him test the limits of weight the branches could support.  Eventually he reached a point where he would have to drop to the ground, and he paused, waiting for the call to sound again.  Hearing nothing, he pursed his lips and made a call of his own, dredging up the memory of the small Wendlyn finch whose song was his identification in Terrasen.  Nothing but local birds responded.  He called again.  
  
When there was still no response, he turned to head back to where he was supposed to be.  He had just made the first leap when the call came again, very close.  A faint rustling sounded, and he dropped to the ground and pulled two knives.  As silently as he could, he stalked through the trees, taking a circuitous route to where he had pinpointed the noise.  He could smell a man in a cluster of bushes; a man who smelled like home.  Edging forward cautiously, he finally spotted the other person, crouched in the bushes, looking in the direction from which Aedion had called.  The man whistled again.  
  
Aedion lunged into the bushes and emerged with the man clasped against his chest, his knife against the stranger’s throat.  “Put your hands where I can see them,” he breathed.  With a frustrated growl, the man did as he was told, dropping the stiletto he carried to the ground.  Aedion eased up on his hold, allowing the stranger to turn to face him.  
  
“Ashryver!” the man exclaimed, then clapped his hand over his own mouth.  He did look slightly familiar.  “I can’t believe it!” he went on in a whisper.  “They said you were alive, but…” he shook his head.  
  
“Are you one of Darrow’s men?” Aedion asked, trying to place him.  
  
He shook his head again.  “Clery’s.  I’m Flinn.”  He held out his hand.  
  
Aedion blinked at the extended hand but didn’t take it.  “Lord Clery’s still alive?”    
  
Flinn nodded, dropping his hand. “Alive, but not a lord anymore.  Surrendered his title and his lands in exchange for his life.”  A grin spread across his face.  “Boy, Miss Delaney’s going to be happy I saw you.”  
  
Aedion’s knees nearly gave out.  “Delaney…She made it then?  She’s alive?”  
  
“Alive, well, living in Clery’s house now.”  
  
Holy gods, it was the best news he’d had in months.  “Look, I don’t have much time,” he said, “but if you’ve made camp near here, or anyone has, move it quick.  Adarlan’s running a training exercise and this is right next to the border of it.”  
  
“We know,” Flinn replied, “that’s why I’m here.”    
  
Aedion didn’t want to know how they knew.  “Just be careful.  Don’t get caught.  I can’t protect you if you do.”    
  
Flinn nodded, his homely face serious.  “What’s your plan, Prince?”  
  
Glancing behind him, Aedion ignored the question.  “I’ve got to go back.  Tell any others to be safe, don’t engage.”  Looking back at Flinn, he extended his hand, and when Flinn took it pulled him in close for a clap on the back.  “Tell Delaney…just tell her I’ll see her.”    
  
Before Flinn could respond, he headed back into the trees.  
  
*****  
  
The next few days passed uneventfully.  There was no further sign of Flinn, or any others.  So far Osment had been caught a handful of times, but nobody had thought to look for Aedion in the trees.  They had generally tracked him as far as he’d remained on the ground, but though he’d deliberately left signs of his climb they had gone unnoticed.  Mikkal agreed that they should keep his method secret until the end of training.  Part of the point was to get the men to think differently than they did on the plains.  
  
Raedan’s group arrived on the evening of the fourth day.  They hadn’t spoken since the night in the watch tower other than what was necessary between a soldier and an officer, and though they were near each other at the evening meal he didn’t attempt to close the gap.  There was the faintest twinge of guilt when he realized that Raedan didn’t know his sister was safe, but then anger surged anew as he remembered those bitter words and he kept his silence.   
  
Still, it was not a shock when Aedion realized Raedan was well on his trail the next day.  He had gone out far to the west, to the three mile limit of the exercise, crossing a couple small streams and climbing in and out of the trees.  He could hear him, puzzling out where Aedion had walked up stream for a hundred yards before coming out on the same bank and returning to the trees.  Raedan had taken the bait, and was on the far side, searching for clues, when suddenly Aedion realized that they weren’t alone.  There were other footsteps, more subtle hidden ones, creeping through the undergrowth, an unfamiliar scent that hit him faintly as the wind blew in his direction.   
  
His mouth went dry, his palms sweaty.  The stranger might be no threat, but then why hide his approach?  He dropped to the ground and moved as quickly and quietly as he could.  When he heard Raedan’s startled cry, he gave up all pretense of stealth and flat out sprinted, pulling out his knives as he ran.    
  
Reaching the stream, he thought he was going to vomit as he smelled fresh blood.  Raedan was down on the ground, a man in dark green standing over him holding a knife.  As the stranger bent over the prone form, Aedion gave a shout and the man looked up.  Aedion’s aim was true.  His knife sank into the man’s right eye, dropping him where he stood.  Leaping the stream, he was on Raedan before the stranger stopped twitching.    
  
His brother’s breathing was labored, and there was blood spreading through his tunic.  Gray-green eyes, dulled with pain, met his.  “I’m…”    
  
“Don’t talk,” Aedion ordered, ripping open the shirt.  Deep wound on the left side, bleeding heavily but not likely fatal.  But the sucking sound the wound made with each breath would be if he couldn’t stop it.  He tore a strip from the shirt and wrapped it tight around Raedan’s chest, but air still sucked in through the weave of the fabric.  Raedan started to flail, desperate for air.    
  
“Raedan,” Aedion said sternly, putting all the command he possessed in his voice.  “Stop moving.  I need to seal this.”  Raedan quieted, though his dilated eyes still stared frantically at every move Aedion made.  Stripping off his boot and his belt, he wadded up his sock and packed it over the wound, then strapped his belt over it.  This stopped the horrible sucking sound, and Raedan began breathing a little more easily.  Aedion looked at the plants around them; lucky they were so close to water.  “Do not move.  I will be right back.”  
  
There was club moss and goldenseal nearby.  He used a knife to cut off a wad of the club moss, then yanked the goldenseal out of the ground.  After rinsing the roots off in the stream, he stuffed them in his mouth and chewed as he returned to the small clearing.    
  
Raedan’s eyes were closed, and his lips were pale and slightly purple.  Shit shit shit.  “You still with me my brother?” he asked as he undid the belt.  Raedan made an indistinct noise in response.  The bleeding had slowed to a trickle, and the clot in the wound seemed to hold as he released the tension. Gently placing the chewed roots in the wound, he then covered it with the moss and tied it all in place with the strip of Raedan’s shirt.  Without the tight pressure from the belt, Raedan’s breathing eased slightly.    
  
“Aedion,” he rasped, then his eyes closed and his head lolled.    
  
“I’m going to get you home,” Aedion said, though he was pretty sure Raedan was unconscious. As he started to slide his arms under Raedan’s shoulders and knees, he heard footsteps.  Releasing his hold, he stood and palmed another knife, waiting.  Flinn emerged cautiously from between the trees just as Aedion threw, the knife hitting a tree right next to his head as Aedion drew another.  Flinn’s eyes were wide as he stared from the blade wobbling in the tree inches from him to the body of the stranger, to Raedan lying limp between Aedion’s feet, then back to the stranger.  
  
Pointing the knife at Flinn, Aedion snarled, “I told you not to engage, you son of a bitch.”    
  
Flinn blanched at the fury rolling off of him and held up his hands.  “I didn’t.  I told everyone to stand down, I swear,” he said.  “What have you done, Ashryver?”  
  
“What have _I_ done?” Aedion roared.  “I put a knife through his gods-damned eye after he stabbed my brother, that’s what!”  His voice lowered.  “And I’ll do the same to you if you come after us.”     
  
“I won’t,” Flinn swore, and Aedion believed him.  He bent again to pick Raedan up, gently sliding his hands under him, marking the quick, shallow breaths and the thready pulse beating in his throat.  “Ashryver!”  Flinn called after him as he jumped the stream, but he didn’t turn back, didn’t pause, just set into a run he could maintain for the three miles back to the village.  
  
*****  
  
Mikkal was sitting up in the small bed, running his fingers through Aedion’s hair, watching the boy propped up on pillows in the other bed breathe.  He would never forget the sight of Aedion appearing at the edge of the woods, Raedon Lamar’s lifeless body in his arms, snarling at the small grouping of soldiers to get out of his way as he ran towards the healer’s cottage.  Nor would he easily forget his prowling while the healer used a small hollow tube to remove the air trapped around Lamar’s lungs, then disinfected and stitched the wound.  Luckily the healer was unfazed by it all, merely looking between them with the same cool amusement she had the first time they’d met her.    
  
Now it was coming dawn and they were tucked in the spare room of the healer’s cottage.  The idea of getting Aedion to go back to the inn was laughable; fortunately the healer had no other patients at the moment so hadn’t objected when Mikkal had asked if they could stay.  He had finally persuaded Aedion to lay down, and within minutes of settling his head in Mikkal’s lap Aedion had been asleep.  
  
Raedan had woken up twice during the night for a few moments but had not seemed particularly aware before being sucked back into unconsciousness.  Mikkal had little memory of his own injury, but if he recalled correctly it had been a few days before he had been able to stay awake for any length of time.  He wondered if Aedion would insist on staying here that whole time.  He would have to send a letter to camp in the morning; there was no way they would continue training, but he didn’t know if his father would want to try to investigate further into the situation.  At least Aedion had taken care of the man himself, but the whole thing was still odd.    
  
He leaned his head back against the wall and sighed, wishing for a book.  Looking back at Raedan, he saw he was awake again, and this time there was alertness in his face.  “Welcome back,” he said quietly.  Raedan groaned quietly in response.  “It’s all right, don’t try to talk.  It’s going to hurt for a few days.”  Carefully, he transferred Aedion’s head to a pillow and slipped out of bed.  The healer had left a brew for him should he awaken, so he brought that over and carefully eased Raedan up into a more complete sitting position before bringing the cup to his lips.  After a few sips, he helped him settle back and gently tucked the blankets around him.  “Are you comfortable?”  Raedan nodded.  Mikkal checked his forehead; it was cool, no sign of fever.  He sat down in the chair between the beds, checking first to confirm Aedion was miraculously still asleep.  
  
“Is he all right?” Raedan rasped.  
  
“Yes, he’s fine.  You really should try to rest.”    
  
Raedan shook his head once, his face tightening.  Mikkal took his hand and gave it a gentle squeeze.  Raedan squeezed back, hard, then slumped back in the pillows.  Mikkal’s thumb rubbed soothing circles on the back of the hand he held, and slowly Raedan’s eyes drifted shut, leaving Mikkal alone to watch the sun coming up through the windows.  
  
*****  
  
Aedion was struggling to control his restlessness.  After sleeping for a few hours, he’d awakened to find Raedan still sleeping, with Mikkal dozing in the chair next to him, holding his hand.  The healer had checked Raedan out and advised them that he shouldn’t be moved for at least a week.  Mikkal had kicked Aedion out to get food for them both, claiming it was so they wouldn’t trouble the healer but he suspected it was because his pacing was driving everyone crazy.  
  
The inn dining room had been full of his fellow soldiers, and they all fell on him asking for an update on Raedan.  Evidently Mikkal had sent a couple of them back to the clearing to see what they could learn about the assailant, but it hadn’t been much.  They had stripped him of his weapons and recovered Aedion’s knife and boot but that was all.  He didn’t dare ask about his second knife; he didn’t want to explain how it ended up in the tree.   
  
Laden with food and a satchel with a few necessities from his room, he returned to the cottage.  The healer was with another patient, so he slipped through silently and headed to the back room.  He could hear low voices, and he stopped, listening.    
  
Mikkal was talking.  “Is it because I’m male, or because I exist at all?”  
  
“Neither,” came Raedan’s sandpaper whisper.  “It’s just…” He paused to draw a rattling breath.  “Delaney left because of him.  If he…loved her…”  
  
He could hear a gasp, then movement, and Mikkal murmuring, “Here, here, it’s all right.  Squeeze my hand as hard as it hurts.”  There was a long stretch of quiet, then, “He told me about it, you know.  He sent your sister away _because_ he loved her.  No, it’s true.”  Aedion wondered what Raedan had done to earn that sharper tone.  “You know what those bastards did to him.  That was mild compared to what they would have done to her if she had stayed, and he knew it.”  
  
It was time for him to interrupt.  He let the bags rustle as he walked the few steps to the room, then set down one loudly to open the door.  Raedan was sitting propped up with cushions, alert though pale and drawn.  Mikkal was lounging in the chair, the picture of calm.  Aedion unloaded the food, including a small lidded bowl of gruel that the cook had assured him Raedan would be able to get down easily.    
  
Mikkal left after the meal to check in with the other soldiers, planning on sending them all back to camp unless word otherwise had been received from the general.  Raedan had managed several mouthfuls of the gruel before falling back against his pillows and almost instantaneously nodding off.  Aedion stretched out on the bed with the book he’d brought from the inn, soon losing himself in the epic tale of battle in the Red Desert until Raedan’s groan had him flashing to his side.  
  
“What can I get you?  Water?  Food?  Do you need the healer?”  
  
Raedan’s exasperated expression was so familiar he wanted to laugh.  “I have to pee,” Raedan said, blushing faintly, once Aedion allowed a word in.  A quick consultation with the healer, and Aedion carefully helped him into the bathing room, then back to bed where he proceeded to fluff pillows unnecessarily until Raedan glared him into the chair.  They stared at each other for a while.       
  
“I understand,” Raedan finally said.    
  
“What do you understand?” Aedion asked, tapping his fingers against his knee.  
  
“Why you’re in love with him.”  Raedan gaze dropped down to his hands, then back up to meet Aedion’s eyes.  “I’m sorry, about before.  I was…horrible.”  
   
Aedion nodded slowly.  He didn’t know what to say.  He still felt raw at times from the wounds those words had inflicted, but he had known the second he’d heard the footsteps stalking through the woods that in the long run it didn’t matter.  Raedan was the closest thing he still had to family.  He held out his hand.  “It’s all right, brother.”  Raedan clasped his hand and sighed, as if some weight had been lifted.  His eyes closed, and he drifted back to sleep, hand still engulfed in Aedion’s own.  
  
Aedion himself was starting to doze when the door was flung open and Mikkal was there, looking like a man who had been dealt a mortal blow.  Aedion could smell the anguish rolling off of him, and stood so quickly the chair crashed over, startling Raedan awake.  There were no injuries Aedion could sense.  “Mikkal!  What -”  
  
“My orders came,” Mikkal replied in a voice so hollow as to be unrecognizable.  “My father sent them back with the messenger.  I’m going back to Fenharrow.”  
  
The world stopped.  Aedion had known it was likely that Mikkal would have to leave, had known it with his mind, but that didn’t stop the words from stabbing him in the heart.  “When?” he whispered.  
  
“Two weeks.  I have to leave in two weeks.”  
  
Aedion gathered Mikkal into his arms, pressing his face into his neck, breathing in that familiar musky scent.  He didn’t care that Raedan was watching, or that the door was open and the healer was down the hall.  All he cared about was that Mikkal was clinging to him as hard as he could, was shaking in his arms, and that he couldn’t fix it.  There was nothing he could do or say to stop this pain, for either of them.  So he squeezed his eyes shut and held on, as that was all he knew how to do.    
  
*****  
  
Delaney sighed as she picked the scissors up to cut the pattern for yet another dress.  She really, really hated sewing.  Always had, actually; repairs had been her least favorite part of being a laundress, and right now she wanted nothing more than to ram these scissors into the critical eye of the woman who stood in front of her.  She missed Ea’s bakery, the warm sweet smells and the feel of dough and even Ea’s grunts.   
  
Mabina had no trouble talking.  In fact, she rarely seemed to stop.  Delaney had been there for a week now and was pretty certain there had only been about five minutes of quiet the whole time.  She wouldn’t have minded so much if the woman’s bird-like chirping hadn’t shifted into hateful scorn every time she addressed Delaney.  
  
Not that she could totally blame her.  Mabina’s husband had been slaughtered in the initial invasion for possessing magic, and Delaney was pretty certain her presence was lemon juice on that still-fresh wound.  She didn’t understand why Mabina had volunteered to take her on as an apprentice, and sometimes wondered exactly how much money had changed hands to make it happen.    
  
Despite all that, Mabina did know her craft and was a good, if impatient, teacher.  Making clothing from scratch was a different creature than mending, and Mabina’s attention to detail was profound.  Unfortunately for them both, Delaney, though proficient with a needle, lacked the natural eye to gauge fit and drape, so the entire process was akin to teaching a lapdog to hunt.  It wasn’t impossible, but it sure wasn’t easy.  
  
At least her other lessons were progressing well.  Kerrin had taken over self-defense when Fulke had left and she now had drilled enough that her initial reactions were automatic.  It was Clery, though, who had insisted she learn how to handle a knife and who had gifted her with a stiletto of her own.  Clery also worked with her on writing in code.  He had begun to prepare her to go to Rifthold.  One of his spies there had been coming under a little too much suspicion, and he had pulled him out just the week before.  Delaney was to take his place.    Clery’s concession to her challenges with sewing was to assign one of his remaining spies to find her a job in a bakery.  She had suggested more than once trying to get into a private home, where it might be easier to get information, but Clery had negated that.    
  
“Unless you want to be under your master half the time, you’re better off working for a public business,” had been his final word on the subject.  
  
So Delaney cut and stitched and sewed buttons, somehow never managing to make the finished product come out quite right.  Until now, when the simple shift actually hung right on the dress form and for once Mabina didn’t look like she was going to cry at the waste of fabric.  It was with a rare sense of triumph that Delaney packed up her space for the day and headed home through the streets.    
  
That evening, she was sitting in Clery’s study puzzling through a new way of coding letters.  “How do you know what code I’m using?” she asked.  Each version strived to make the writing seem innocuous, so all the codes used many of the same words.   
  
“I told you,” he said with some asperity, “for this one, you begin with ‘Greetings.’  For the last one, it’s ‘Dearest Uncle.’  Then the first one you learned is ‘Salutations.’  Are you sure you’re going to be able to manage this?”  
  
“I remember all the different codes,” she snapped, “it’s just the beginnings I keep forgetting.”  
  
“Well it won’t do me a damn bit of good if you don’t remember that part, so I suggest you try a little harder,” he grumbled in response.    
  
They were still sniping at each other when the door burst open and a filthy man Delaney vaguely recognized flew into the room.  “Flinn!” Clery exclaimed.  “What the hell are you doing here?”  
  
“Sorry, sir, I know I was to send a messenger but I thought I best come myself.”  His face was grim.  Delaney rose to leave, generally not welcome at these types of meetings.  “Miss, I think perhaps you should stay,” Flinn said with a slight bow to her.  She looked at Clery, who nodded, and returned to her seat.  
  
“Paget’s soldiers were in Oakwald, just as you had said they would be.  I saw him, sir,” Flinn began.  
  
“Ashryver?” Clery asked sharply.  Delaney’s hand rose to her mouth.  
  
Flinn nodded.  “Yes, saw him and spoke with him, twice.”  
  
“You weren’t supposed to approach,” Clery said, lips pressed in a thin line.  
  
“I didn’t, sir.  He answered one of my calls.”  
  
“You’re joking!”  
  
“No, sir, he came and found me.”  He turned to Delaney.  “He was right pleased to hear you were all right, miss.”  She smiled, picturing his bright-eyed grin.    
  
Clery leaned in.  “Did he say anything of use?”  
  
Flinn shook his head.  “Not much, no, sir.  Just warned us to stay back, that he wouldn’t be able to protect us if we were caught.”  Clery nodded, but before he could speak, Flinn went on.  “I think we may have lost him, though, sir.”  
  
“What do you mean?” Delaney said sharply, ignoring Clery’s glare.  
  
“Well, miss, it’s that one of our men didn’t follow orders.”  He looked to Clery anxiously.  “Aisnir, sir.  I told him to stay back, sir.  I told him…”  
  
“What happened,” Clery ordered, and there was dread in his voice.  
  
“Aisnir killed one of Ashryver’s men, sir.  Ashryver…didn’t take it well.”  
  
 _No, he wouldn’t have_ , Delaney thought.  Aedion was protective of anyone he felt responsible for.    
  
Clery swore.  “Where is Aisnir now?”  
  
“I left him where I found him, sir,” Flinn said grimly, and Clery cursed again.  
  
Delaney almost asked what that meant, and then realized - Aedion must have killed him.  She swallowed hard.  It was so hard to picture him doing that, to imagine those hands that had carried and soothed her sisters taking a life, even though she knew it was what he was trained for.  
  
Clery was shaking his head.  “Damn it.  Darrow warned me Aisnir couldn’t be trusted, I should have listened.”  He sighed.  “Do you really think that would keep Ashryver from helping us, though?  After everyone Adarlan took from him?”  
  
“I don’t know,” Flinn said slowly.  “I had heard him shout, and went to see what had happened.  He was so furious, I thought he was going to kill me too.  I’m frankly a little surprised he didn’t.”  He paused for a moment.  “He…he doesn’t have any family left, does he?”  
  
“Not on this continent,” Clery answered, brow furrowed.  “He has some relatives in Wendlyn, but they never sent for him and he never asked to go back, even after the assassinations.  Why?”  
  
Flinn seemed a little confused.  “That’s what I had thought.  It’s just that he told me the fallen man was his brother.”  
  
“What?” Delaney whispered, certain she had heard wrong.  Desperate to know she had. Because there was only one person she could think of whom Aedion would call brother.  
  
“When I found them, I asked him what had happened, and he told me Aisnir had stabbed his brother.  I didn’t know…” he trailed off, looking at Delaney in concern.  “Miss?  Delaney?  Are you all right?”  
  
“What did he look like?”  The voice she heard was not her own, though she was certain she had spoken.  
  
“Ashryver?”  
  
“No,” she said, her chest squeezing so tight she could barely draw breath. “The man who was…”  
  
“I didn’t really see him very well.”  
  
“Please,” she said, tears beginning to fall.  Clery came around and squeezed her shoulder.  “Please, tell me what you know.”  
  
Flinn glanced at Clery, who nodded, not taking his concerned eyes off Delaney.  “He was about my size.  Maybe a little taller.  Light brown hair.  Young, around Ashryver’s age?”    
  
Delaney broke down completely.  Raedan.  It had to be Raedan.  How had he even been out there?  Oh, gods, her brother, her little brother…She could picture him toddling around camp after her, lisping her name.  Picking up Maida, so proud of his baby sister.  The last time she’d seen him, when he’d hugged her and promised to look after Aedion.  What had she done?  What had she put into motion by asking him for that?  All this time, she’d been so scared for Aedion, it had never occurred to her Raedan was at risk.  
  
She vaguely became aware of Clery kneeling in front of her, talking to her.  “Delaney, you’re going to make yourself sick.  Tell me what’s wrong.”  
  
“My brother,” she choked out, and then she did start retching.  Someone shoved a wastebasket in front of her and she emptied her stomach into it before relapsing into sobs.  She heard voices speaking, but couldn’t track what was being said; the door opened and closed repeatedly, warm arms were wrapped around her, and then she was lifted and carried into her room and settled gently onto her bed.  
  
She didn’t know how long it was before she had cried herself out.  Slowly, she became aware again of her surroundings, of the softness of her bed, of gentle hands stroking her hair.  Clery was sitting next to her, face drawn and gray.    
  
“I’m so sorry, honey,” he said hoarsely.  “I didn’t know…you had said you’d had a brother, but I didn’t even think…”  
  
“It’s not your fault.”  Her voice sounded dead to her own ears.  “I didn’t know he’d left Perrington’s.”  Not that it would’ve changed anything if she had.    
  
“I sent one of my best riders to the town near Paget’s camp.  Flinn’s not certain he’s…Flinn’s not certain what happened.  We should know in about ten days.”  There was a long silence broken only by Delaney’s occasional hiccoughs.  “What’s your brother’s name?”  
  
“Raedan.  His name was Raedan.”  She closed her eyes against the dim light of the room as pain washed over her again and the tears began anew.


	12. Chapter 12

General Paget allowed Aedion and Mikkal to remain with Raedan a couple more days before ordering them back to camp.  Mikkal suspected it was his father’s tactful way of allowing him some time to get himself together after receiving the orders.  
  
It didn’t really help.  
  
Now, as they rode through the gates, he felt like he was being sucked under the quicksand again.  He had first gotten trapped in it two years ago, when he had watched his arrow enter the body of a man in Terrasen armor.  He had kept fighting in that moment; had had to, in order to make his way clear of the mob of blade-wielding flesh, each fallen man dragging him farther and farther in.  Being sent to Fenharrow after that battle had been a relief, a chance to get as far away as possible from the site of his cowardice.  But it had followed him, as the fighting had, and the moment his knife had slashed the throat of the man whose own dagger had just pierced his chest he had been pulled completely under.  He had still been dragging himself out when he stopped in a town to delay coming home and had seen a huge golden-haired man coolly returning his gaze in the inn.    
  
It was still just mid-afternoon, and the late summer sun had baked the grass in the camp brown. They passed his mother out strolling around the square, accompanying Mrs. Ivry and her new baby.  The women waved and they returned the gesture.  “I guess we’ll have to say hello after we’ve put away the horses,” he muttered.  Aedion laughed.    
  
“Since you’re so enthusiastic, I can untack Chetak for you,” he offered.    
  
“How about I take care of Avenar, and you can go charm the ladies and gush over the baby.”   
  
“Don’t you like babies?” Aedion asked, grinning.  
  
Mikkal gave a theatrical shudder.  “They’re fine, as long as I don’t have to touch them.  Or listen to them cry.  Or carry them around.  Actually, they’re kind of awful.”  
  
“You’re a cold-hearted bastard,” Aedion chuckled, shaking his head.    
  
Watching Aedion with tiny Morghanna half an hour later, Mikkal found that cold heart melting just a little.  Mrs. Ivry was more than happy to hand her baby over to the warrior, and he somehow knew exactly how to cradle that small head in his palm, supporting her body with his forearm.     
  
“See, now,” his mother said at his elbow.  “Don’t you want that?”  
  
 _Yes_ , he thought, _but not the baby, just the one holding it_.  He made a noncommittal noise, and she looked up at him.    
  
“I just want you to be happy, Mikkal,” she said.  “Don’t you want to fall in love?”  
  
“I have, Mother,” he said quietly, avoiding her eyes as his father’s advice to him from weeks ago echoed in his head.  
  
“You have?”  She perked up like a dog being offered a juicy bone.  “With whom?”  
  
He gestured with his chin in the direction of Aedion, who chose that exact moment to look up at him and smile over his armful of infant.  Looking down at his mother, he watched her eyes travel from him to Aedion and back again.  “Oh,” she said faintly.  “But…”  He waited for the outburst, the disappointment and the tears.  The latter did well up as she turned her face up to his.  “But you’re leaving.  Isn’t he staying here?”  
  
The ground shifted under his feet, then firmed up.  “You’re not…disappointed?”  
  
She slipped her hand around his arm.  “Of course I am.  You’re going to have a whole country separating you.  Unless you think he could be reassigned?”  
  
He closed his eyes and swallowed hard, then bent and kissed the top of her head.  “I don’t think so, Mother.”    
  
“Well,” she said, patting his arm, “I’ll talk to your father.  Maybe he can do something.”  She looked at him seriously.  “You deserve to be happy, Mikkal.  Don’t think I don’t know what you’ve been through.”  That possibility terrified him more than he could admit.  He turned the subject back to more mundane things, and she chattered about the baby and the doings in town while he walked her back to the house.  
  
Late that night, wrapped up so closely with Aedion they might still have been joined, he murmured into the dark, “I told my mother today.”  
  
“Hmmm?” Aedion said, nuzzling into the back of his neck.  “What did you tell her?”  
  
“That I -” _am in love with you_.  “That we’re together.”  
  
Aedion nipped at his ear.  “And what was her response?”  
  
Mikkal gave a little a laugh, still not believing it.  “She was just upset that I have to leave, and you can’t come with me.”  The arms around him tightened, pulling him even closer.    
  
*****  
  
For days, Delaney did not leave her room.  Clery came and sat with her; so did Kerrin, and various other friends she had made but now barely recognized. Though she spoke and ate and saw to her needs mechanically, nothing really registered.  She couldn’t have told if it was day or night, fair or rainy, hot or cold.  All she could think about, all she could see waking or sleeping, was Raedan.     
  
*****  
  
Aedion had been back at camp for almost a week when he received word that Raedan had returned and was in the infirmary.  He dropped Avenar’s brushes back in the bucket and left her with a quick pat, half-running to the long building he’d thankfully rarely needed to visit.   
  
“My brother,” Aedion greeted Raedan, who gave a poor attempt at a smile in return as they clasped hands.  “You all right?  You look…”  
  
Raedan grimaced. “The trip was a bit rough,” he said, his voice tight.  “I’ll be fine.”  
  
The healer appeared then with some sort of concoction that Raedan sipped at while she returned to her office.  They sat in silence until his expression eased a bit as the herbs took effect.  “I’m glad you’re back,” Aedion said, not quite understanding the shadow that flickered over that pale face in response.  He looked around the unfamiliar room, searching for something to say, something to close the gap that had opened between them that night in the tower.    
  
“You killed that man, didn’t you,” Raedan said abruptly.  Aedion met his eyes, startled by the anguish in them.  
  
“Yes, I did.”  He paused as the healer’s assistant came over.    
  
“Do you want to take your evening meal here, Lieutenant?  I can have the kitchen bring it over.”  
  
“That would be lovely, thank you.”  After she walked off and the room was empty again, he turned back to Raedan and asked the question that had been on his mind since the incident.  “How much do you remember?”  
  
Raedan looked down at his hands, folded over the sheet.  “I remember when I saw the rope marks on the tree, and realized you’d climbed up.  I knew nobody had found you yet, so I figured you had some trick up your sleeve.”  A small smile flared, then disappeared.  “So then I followed where the branches looked different, until I got to that stream.  It was obvious you’d gone into it, but I couldn’t figure out where you’d come out.  So I was looking around on that far bank, and I heard someone right behind me.  I thought it was you, and I started to turn around.  And then I felt the knife…”  
  
 _Oh gods. Oh, holy forsaking gods_. “You thought -” he couldn’t finish the sentence.  
  
“Just for a moment.”  Raedan sniffed and wiped surreptitiously at his face.  “Then he said something, and I realized it wasn’t you, his voice was totally different.  I had fallen down, and he rolled me over, and that was when I…I knew I was going to die.”  Aedion wanted to touch him, hold him, something to prove to them both that he had made it through, but he didn’t know what to do.  How it would be received.  So he pressed his fingers between his knees and waited.  
  
Raedan sniffed again, and when he spoke next he sounded almost as if he were in a trance.  “And then I heard you shout, and the man fell, and you were there.”  He turned his tear-streaked face to Aedion’s.  “I kind of thought I heard you yelling at someone, but it might’ve been a dream; I had the strangest dreams.”  There was a short silence, and he seemed to shake himself before going on in a more normal voice.  “The next thing I was certain of was waking up in that cottage with my chest feeling like it was on fire and Captain Paget watching me.”    
  
“I’m just so glad I got there in time.”  
  
“And you really…you killed him.”  Aedion nodded, not certain why he seemed so fixed on this detail.  “You…” Raedan’s breath caught.    
  
“Raedan, I’ve killed people before,” he reminded him.  
  
“But that was an accident.  You didn’t mean to.”    
  
Aedion’s brow furrowed.  “With Balam, that’s true, not that I regret it.  But…I I killed people before that, and believe me, I meant to.”  
  
Raedan didn’t answer, just shook his head and stared at the bumps his feet made under the sheet.  The healer’s assistant came over then with two covered trays.  “You doing all right, honey?” she asked Raedan as she set a tray carefully on his lap.  “Need any more of that tonic?”    
  
“No, thank you, I’m doing better,” he replied.  She smiled at him before handing Aedion his tray and leaving them alone.  They both uncovered their food.  Aedion started to eat, until he noticed Raedan just poking at his meat with his fork.  He set his own utensils down.  
  
“He was from Terrasen, did you know that?” Raedan asked  
  
 _Yes_.  “No.  How do you know?  I thought they couldn’t figure out who he was.”  
  
“You have the same accent.  Or had, rather.”  He brushed at his cheek again.  
  
Damn.  Raedan really was sometimes too observant for his own good.  Or at least for Aedion’s.  “Why are you so upset I killed someone who was trying to kill you?”  
  
“I’m not upset,” Raedan snapped, and Aedion bit back his incredulous laugh.  Raedan let his head drop back until it hit the wall.  After a moment, he met Aedion’s steady eyes.  “It’s just…He was from Terrasen.  And you had to…”  He wrapped his arm around himself, palm pressing against his side.    
  
“Raedan.”  Aedion rested his hand lightly on his shoulder.  “I don’t care where he was from.  He tried to kill you without provocation.”  
  
“He had provocation,” was the quiet reply.    
  
A long moment passed while Aedion sorted through what Raedan had said.  “What did he say to you?” he finally asked.   
  
Raedan picked up his fork, stabbed a piece of meat and lifted it halfway to his mouth before setting it back down.  “He said…He said, ‘For my son.’”  
  
Aedion closed his eyes and leaned back in his chair, rubbing his hand over his face.  When he opened his eyes again, Raedan was watching him.  “I did what I did,” Aedion said firmly, “and I would do it again.”  
  
Raedan held his eyes for a long moment, then nodded once and turned his attention at last to his food.  They talked of lighter subjects while they ate, of Raedan’s expected rehabilitation, of the boredom that comes from long hours of inactivity.  “I can bring you some books,” Aedion offered.  
  
“I’ve seen the crap you read,” Raedan replied.  “I’m not interested in that romantic shit.”  
  
Aedion grinned.  “I know it’s not fine literature, but there’s fucking,” he offered.  
  
Raedan looked at him, humor playing on his face.  “I’m not sure I should in my condition.”  
  
At that, Aedion roared with laughter, earning a reprimand from the healer.  “In the books, smartass,” he said after she had disappeared back into her office.  
  
“I know, you idiot.  I think I just want something…funny though.  Do you have anything like that?”  
  
Aedion shrugged.  “Well, some of the writing in those books is laughable.”  Raedan grinned.  “I’ll see what I can find you in town.  Mikkal and I were going to go tomorrow.”  
  
All amusement left Raedan’s face.  “When does he leave?”  
  
“Five days,” Aedion said quietly, unable to keep the flicker of pain off his face.  
  
“Why the hell are you sitting here with me then?”  
  
Aedion’s lips twisted into what he hoped would pass for a smile.  “I have a meeting in a little while.  I’ll spend time with him afterwards.”  Raedan nodded, and after a pause asked about one of the other regulars’ ongoing struggles with remaining awake on watch.  They talked about training and camp problems until Aedion had to leave for his meeting.  Judging by the way Raedan’s eyelids were beginning to droop, he figured it was about time anyway.  
  
An hour later, he slipped through Mikkal’s small house and into his room.  Mikkal was in his bathing room, toweling off, and Aedion came up behind him and gathered him into his arms.  Dropping the towel on the sink, Mikkal leaned back against him, and Aedion pressed his lips against Mikkal’s neck before resting his chin against the bare shoulder.    
  
“Everything all right?” Mikkal asked, giving a little squeeze to one of the arms wrapped around him.  
  
 _No.  You’re leaving_.  “I guess so.”  Aedion sighed.  “Raedan was a little strange.”  
  
“How so?”  
  
He sighed again.  “I don’t know.  It was…it was almost like he was upset with me for saving him.”  
  
Mikkal’s body went taut against his.  After a long moment, he relaxed again.  “Well,” he said slowly, “maybe he feels…guilty.”  
  
“Why the hell would he feel guilty?”  Aedion asked, pulling away just enough to be able to see part of Mikkal’s face.  “I told him I didn’t mind, that I’d do it again; he’s like my brother.”    
  
“But that might not be what he feels guilty about.”  
  
Aedion thought about that for a moment.  “I don’t know what you mean.”  
  
“Look, he almost died.  I’d bet he thought he was going to.”  Aedion made a noise of agreement.  “So, maybe he feels bad that someone else did.”  
  
“I can understand that,” Aedion muttered.  
  
“Mmm.”  Mikkal turned in his arms and Aedion rested his forehead on the shorter man’s, as he had done so many times before.  “And maybe he feels a little bad about that fight you two had.”  
  
Aedion growled a little.  “He thought it was me at first.”  
  
“What?” Mikkal asked sharply, pulling away just enough to be able to look him in the eye.  “Is that a joke?”  He shook his head mutely.  “That bastard!” Mikkal snarled, and Aedion actually flinched at the fury in that beloved voice.  “I will kill him, I will kill him myself.”  
  
Aedion laughed a little and cupped that beautiful face in his hands.  “That would waste a lot of hard work on my part,” he said, one corner of his mouth twitching up.  “And to be fair, he only thought it for a second because he heard footsteps and assumed it was me.”  
  
A tiny fraction of the anger drained out.  “Still.  That he would ever think that you would hurt him…”  
  
“I know.”  Aedion kissed Mikkal lightly.  When he got little reaction, he kissed him again, then a third time, teasing him a little with his lips and tongue.  Finally Mikkal thawed, and when he responded it was with the fiery intensity that always took Aedion’s breath away.  His hands ran up that smooth, muscled back and he let himself be pushed back against the wall.    
  
Mikkal grunted as his hip drove into one of Aedion’s knives.  “Really?” he said drily.  “You didn’t think to take these off?”  
  
“What’s the fun in that?” Aedion asked, his crooked grin spreading.  He watched as Mikkal’s clever fingers divested him of his weapons, dropping them unceremoniously on the floor, before turning to his tunic.  When that joined the knives on the floor and they were wrapped around each other again, Aedion broke away to whisper, “You forgot one,” as he nudged him with his hips.    
  
Mikkal chuckled.  “I have special plans for that one,” he said, flicking open the top button of Aedion’s pants.  “Unless you want me to drop it on the floor with the blades?”  The next button.  “But I think that would ruin my fun.”  He undid the last button and slipped one hand in to grip Aedion’s cock while the other shoved the material over his hips.  
  
Aedion kicked off his boots then stepped out of his pants.  As soon as he was free Mikkal shoved him back against the wall again, taking his mouth with a brutal kiss.  Their hands roamed each other, and when they finally broke apart Aedion couldn’t even think.  He pushed off the wall and spun Mikkal around.    
  
There was something about being with this man, some bridge between them that strengthened with each stroke, each guttural moan, each panting breath.  He didn’t know what it was. All he knew, as they half-staggered out of the bathing room to collapse onto the bed and start up all over again, was that he had no idea how he was going to function in another five days.  Whether he would be able to keep breathing when he watched Mikkal ride out through those gates for the last time.  So he squeezed his eyes closed, memorizing every sonorous cry of his name, the feel of that lean muscled body under his hands, the taste of him on his lips.  
  
When they were finally spent, sprawled out with Mikkal’s head on his shoulder, Aedion watched Mikkal run a long finger over the scar on his palm.  “How did you get this?” Mikkal murmured.  “I’ve been wondering for ages.”  
  
“I’m not sure I should tell you,” he replied honestly.  
  
Amber-colored eyes flicked up to his.  “You don’t have to, I was just wondering.”  He looked back down at his fingers tracing the pale crescent shape.  “It looks kind of like teeth.”  
  
“It was.”  He had spoken aloud unintentionally, and Mikkal glanced back at his face before taking his hand and bringing it to his mouth.  The feel of those soft lips brushing lightly against the scar made a tremor run through him.  Mikkal shifted, and the room went dark before a strong arm and leg wrapped around him again.   He took a deep breath.  “It was a vow I made,” he said quietly.  He huffed air through his nose, thinking of how poorly he was keeping that vow.  “Right after I was captured.”  
  
“You did it to yourself?” Mikkal asked, and he nodded, remembering that dusty camp, the dim tent, the blood dripping through his fingers.  
  
“I needed a…reminder.  Of everything that had been taken from me, and everything that still could be.  All I wanted to do was try to help my people.”  Mikkal’s arm tightened around him, and Aedion was silent for a while.  “That’s still all I want,” he finally whispered, acknowledging the lie to himself as soon as it left his mouth.  There was a long enough pause that he was not sure if Mikkal was even still awake.  
  
“I know,” came the eventual reply, and Aedion’s heart ached with the quiet pain in those two words.    
  
“I’ve done a piss-poor job so far.”  
  
Mikkal moved so he was resting on his elbow and rubbed his free hand over his face.  “You haven’t had a whole hell of a lot of opportunity yet,” he said.  “Once they send you up there, you’ll have a better chance to see what’s really needed.”    
  
“I know what’s needed,” he replied, a bit sharply.  “But I shouldn’t…”  He trailed off, biting the inside of his cheek to shut himself up.  
  
“You shouldn’t tell me.” Mikkal finished.  “You’re not sure you can trust me, after all this.”  He laughed, a terrible, bitter sound.  “You think I don’t know what you want to do?  You think I don’t agree with you?  You honestly think that just because…”  He heaved a deep breath.  “Just because I was born in Adarlan, that I’m blind to its atrocities?  Go to hell, Aedion.”  He got out of bed and crossed to the bathing room.  There was some rustling of clothing, and then he left the room.  Aedion could hear his footsteps down the stairs, then the door of the house close behind him.  
  
*****  
  
As soon as he hit the fresh air, Mikkal could breathe a little easier.  He walked aimlessly, just needing to be away from Aedion’s mistrust, from the revelation of his own insignificance, form the room that still smelled like their lovemaking.  When he finally went back maybe Aedion would be gone.  Maybe that would be for the best, given that there were only a handful of days left.  It was just…he had let himself hope that Aedion maybe felt as he did.  But then he’d always been foolish that way.  
  
His feet carried him towards his parents’ house, then around to the side garden that his mother loved.  It was late enough in the year that most of the flowers were long past, but there were still some rich orange and yellow ones that were bright even in the moonlight near the bench she like to sit on.  He sat in her preferred spot for a few minutes, before he felt driven to move and headed instead to lean over the low wall, looking across the camp towards the gate that he would ride through for the last time soon enough.  His hand found his dagger, and he began twirling it mindlessly, flipping it through his fingers like he often did back when he’d had night watch.  The truth was, now that his head was clearer, he understood Aedion’s reluctance to be open about his plans in Terrasen.  It was probably smart, actually; and that wasn’t really what had hurt anyway, it had just been a little salt in the wound.    
  
A footstep sounded on the gravel behind him and he knew who it would be.  “Mikkal.”  He didn’t move, even though there was something like anguish in that deep voice.  The steps came closer, and he had to force himself not to turn around.  “Mikkal, I’m…I don’t know what to say.”  
  
“You don’t need to say anything.  I understand.”  He half-turned and gave a flicker of a smile.  “You’re right, of course.”    
  
Aedion stepped in front of him, sliding between him and the wall and taking his face in his hands.  “It’s not that I don’t trust you,” Aedion said, and Mikkal wanted to pull away.  He wanted to find the strength to not respond when Aedion’s lips lightly brushed his, to keep his arms from wrapping automatically around the big frame, to maintain the distance that had forced its way between them not an hour ago.  But he couldn’t.  He surrendered himself completely.   
  
*****  
  
Turi finally reached the town mid-afternoon.  He had had four days of riding hard to mull over this peculiar assignment, and had ultimately reached the conclusion that Clery had lost his mind.  Sure, he could mimic an Adarlanian accent as well as anybody, but being sent into the lion’s den to try to find out how this camp was dealing with the death of one of their own at the hands of a Terrasen spy?  Flinn had sworn that he had stripped Aisnir of all possible links to their country,  but this still seemed like an unnecessary risk.  And why Clery needed the name of the murdered man was just another mystery.  Turi hated feeling like information was being withheld.  At least he might have the chance to see Ashryver for himself; he was still having a hard time believing that headstrong boy could have survived the hell of the past two years, no matter what Fulke and Flinn had claimed.  
  
He stopped at the large inn near the town center and handed the exhausted horse to a stable hand.  Clery was smart about how he had his stops arranged, it was pretty easy to keep on a fresh horse, but this last leg was over twenty miles and he’d ridden it at a pretty fast clip.  He requested a room, and then headed out to see what sort of gossip he could pick up on.   
  
There was a small tea shop he stopped in but it was an off time and there were only a couple of other patrons who were talking about getting their gardens set for winter.  Next stop was a book store, and he had been browsing in there for only a couple of minutes, listening to two young women discuss which officer they hoped to land that evening, when he heard a deep voice with an accent that was decidedly Terrasen.  He peered around the stacks, and saw two men towering over the bookseller.  The speaker was a giant of a lieutenant, broad-shouldered as well as tall, with golden hair.  The other man was perhaps an inch or two shorter, much more slender, with black hair and a captain’s insignia on his uniform.  They turned to follow the bookseller to a section, and the bigger man’s eyes passed briefly over him as they passed.    
  
It was Ashryver.  There was no doubt of that, not with those eyes, Evalin’s eyes.  He had to clamp down on the urge to go to him.  Pulling a book off the shelf at random, he flipped through it while surreptitiously watching the two officers peruse the books the seller had pointed out.  Before they could make a selection, he took the book in his hand up to the seller and purchased it, leaving quickly so he could find a good spot to observe them when they were finished.  They emerged onto the street a little while later, walking shoulder to shoulder with matching strides.  They headed in the direction of the inn, and he followed at a discreet distance, wondering who the other man was.    
  
Once in the inn’s tavern, he sat at the bar where he could easily see the two officers at their table.  When his flagon of ale and stew arrived, he ate while trying to not be obvious about watching them.  Not for the first time he wished he had not been an abject failure in training to be a spy, but Clery trusted him and he would do the best he could.    
  
The drunken man next to him turned to him abruptly.  “You’re not from around here, are you,” he slurred.   
  
“No, sir, I’m just passing through,” Turi replied in his best possible Rifthold accent.  
  
The man nodded sagely, looking in the direction Turi’s eyes kept straying.  “Ah, our fine young officers.  The pride and joy of the camp, as it were.”  
  
“Oh?”  Turi tried to control his breathing, to not act too eager.  
  
“Lieutenant Ashryver and Captain Paget,” the drunk went on, a little too loudly.  Turi’s eyes flicked back to the men in question, but they were still deep in conversation.  “They’re inseparable, they are.  Always together.  Day and night, if you get my meaning.”  Turi nodded; it would’ve been hard to miss his insinuation.  “And a good thing.  The captain is a bit of a re…res…restraining influence on the lieutenant.”  
  
Turi chuckled.  “Hard to believe anyone could restrain a man like that.”  
  
“Ah, well, that’s the truth.  You won’t believe it, but I heard he killed a man with one blow.”  He raised his eyebrows, challenging Turi to argue with him.  Turi obliged.  
  
“One blow?  That seems unlikely.”  
  
“Well it happened down south, you know.”  As if somehow the south made men more vulnerable.  “But I did see him drop one of his fellow lieutenants in the street a few months back.”  
  
“He killed a lieutenant?”  _And didn’t end up in prison?_ he didn’t add.  
  
“Nah, nah, didn’t kill him, just floored him.  The bastard deserved it, too.”  That must’ve been the incident Fulke observed.  “It was after that he took up with young Captain Paget there, and since then it’s been pretty quiet.”  He finished his ale and looked longingly at Turi’s half full glass.  Turi took the hint and signaled for another round.  “Until last week, that is.”  
  
“What happened last week?”  
  
The man lifted his new glass in a grateful gesture, then downed a quarter of it in one gulp.  “Heard it myself from one of the men who was there.  I know most of ‘em, you know.  The men at the camp.  Friends, like.”  Pride crept into his voice, and Turi nodded politely.  “There was an attack on one of the young men, someone out in the woods stabbed him in the chest.  Ashryver downed him.  Knife in the eye.  Man I talked to, he was one of the ones who went out to try to identify the attacker.  Said it took two of ‘em to get the knife out of the man’s eye, it was in so deep.”  
  
“Who would attack a soldier on a training exercise?”  
  
“That’s the question, isn’t it?  Nobody knows who the fellow was, or what he had against the young man.”  
  
“The lieutenant must’ve been upset.”  
  
“They said he was like a wild animal.”  The man pointed his finger at Turi.  “Picked that boy up and ran back with him barefoot, three miles they said.  Saved his life.”  
  
“The soldier didn’t die?”   
  
“Nope.  Least, not according to the folks I talked to.”    
  
Now that was interesting.  Flinn had sounded sure the unknown man was dead.  He made a noncommittal noise and the man settled back into his ale, muttering occasionally about other rumored exploits of the officers.  Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Ashryver and his companion rise to leave, pausing briefly at the exit to talk to a large older woman in an apron.  She laughed and patted the captain on the arm, and the two of them disappeared out onto the street.  Turi dropped a couple coins onto the bar and, with a nod to his muttering companion, followed the men.  When he reached the street he could see the captain striding off in the direction of the camp, but there was no sign of Ashryver.  The black-haired man paused, looking in a window, then entered the shop.  Turi looked around him; the street was quiet, just an older couple walking slowly and perusing the various shops on the far side.  He followed the captain.  
  
He was almost at the store the man had gone into when hands shot out of the shadows of a narrow alley between buildings and dragged him deep within.  One covered his mouth, the other had his arms pinned, trapping him against a massive body.  He didn’t struggle; there was no point, unless he wanted to get his neck broken.  Once they were deep enough to not be easily noticed from the street, Ashryver’s deep voice said behind him, “I’m going to let you go, but if you run, or draw attention to yourself, I’m going to kill you.  Understand?”  Turi nodded, and the hands holding him dropped and he spun around.  
  
He could barely see the prince in the shadows, just making out the strong planes of his face in the faint light from the street.  “Why have you been following us?” Ashryver asked.  
  
“I’m not,” Turi tried, in his long-practiced Adarlanian accent.  
  
“Do you take me for a fool?”   
  
Footsteps sounded in the alley, and Turi looked, hoping for someone to save him.  Instead, it was the captain, blocking any escape route.  And while he might have seemed small compared to Ashryver, he still towered over Turi.  There were strange flashes of light from his right hand, and Turi realized he was twirling a dagger.  He wondered if Ashryver was just the distraction, if the killing blow would come from this other man.  Why had he had been so stupid, so careless?  He silently cursed Clery for sending him on this errand.    
  
“I’m going to try again.  Why have you been following us?”  
  
Turi swallowed hard, and spoke in his normal voice.  “I…We had heard that a soldier was killed recently in Oakwald.  I came to find out what happened.”  
  
“You came, or you were sent.”  
  
He hesitated, unsure why Ashryver was making the distinction.  “I was sent.”  
  
“And who sent such a piss-poor spy after us?”  
  
“I’m not a spy,” Turi snapped, then cringed away, expecting a blow for his tone.  When none came, he continued, “I’m a messenger.”  The two men exchanged looks.    
  
“For someone I know?”  After a quick glance at the captain, Turi nodded once.  “And why does anyone from Terrasen care about what happened to a regular from Adarlan?”  
  
“I don’t know.”  The men exchanged a look.  “I’ve been wondering that for the past four days, to be honest.”  
  
Ashryver’s nostrils flared.  “And this still doesn’t explain why you’re following me.”  
  
“I…”  Why was he following Ashryver?  Now that the question was posed to him, it seemed a monstrously idiotic thing to do.  “I don’t even know,” he finally said.  “I just…I saw you and recognized you and…” he trailed off.  
  
To his surprise, it was the captain who filled in for him quietly.  “And you couldn’t believe it.”  He nodded again.  The aristocratic young man caught and held Ashryver’s eye.  “If you want me to leave so you can talk to him, that’s fine.”  
  
Ashryver shook his head.  “No.  Stay.”  He turned to Turi.  “What’s your name, messenger?”  
  
“Turi.”  
  
“Well, Turi, I can guess who sent you, after the catastrophe last week.  And because of that, I will tell you what you want to know.  But you must promise me that you will deliver my whole message.”   
  
“I promise,” Turi said.  
  
“Do you need to write it down?”  
  
Turi shook his head.  “No.  That’s why they use me.”    
  
Ashryver gave a grim smile, and Turi supposed he knew as well as anyone the dangers involved in written correspondence.  “Tell him that the soldier who was stabbed is named Raedan Lamar.  Tell him that he is to never go after someone under my protection again, or it will not end well for him.  And tell Delaney - do you know who Delaney is?”    
  
Turi couldn’t keep the flash of surprise from his features.  “The messenger girl Clery took in?”  
  
Ashryver nodded.  “Tell Delaney that Raedan is safe, he got to a healer in time.”    
  
Turi wondered why the young girl would care, but only asked, “Is that all?”  
  
The captain looked at Ashryver and they seemed to have a silent conversation before the prince turned to Turi again.  “That’s all.  For now.”  The officers started to move up the alley, before he turned back.  “If anybody wants to see me, I come to town once a week at about this time.  When do you leave?”  
  
“Tomorrow, if my horse is rested enough.”  
  
Those strange eyes - even stranger in the moonlight - stared into his for a long moment.  “Safe travels,” the lieutenant-prince said finally, and turned away.  This time, when the two officers disappeared from the alley, he didn’t follow them.  Instead, he leaned against the wall, pressed one shaking hand to his temple, and swore softly.  
  
Because damn.  If they weren’t careful, Ashryver was going to mow them all down.  But if they handled him right…    
  
Suddenly exhausted, he staggered back to his room in the inn.  It was not for him to find a way to set Prince Aedion Ashryver at the head of the Bane.  That was Clery’s problem, and Lord Darrow’s.  As he prepared for bed, he couldn’t help grinning to himself.  In five days he would be home.  And then they would begin to plan.  
  
*****  
  
It took every ounce of discipline Aedion possessed to even make it back to camp without dragging Mikkal off the road into a clump of bushes.  There was something about the way he had prowled down the alley, flipping that dagger, so smooth and strong and threatening; it had been hard to concentrate on the task at hand over the surge of desire.  The whole setup had been Mikkal’s idea, and the simple plan had worked flawlessly.  Aedion shook his head, thinking about it.  Clery was getting either foolish or desperate, but he had smelled no deceit on the messenger.  Just fear.  And home.    
  
Remembering the easy grace with which Mikkal had handled himself caused all other thoughts to fall out of his brain.  Never had he unsaddled Avenar so quickly, nor given her such a poor excuse for a rubdown.  It was mere minutes after their arrival that he was pushing Mikkal into the shadows behind the stable, taking his mouth with his own, hands desperate to find skin.    
  
“Aedion,” Mikkal murmured, and he felt hands pressing against his chest.  “Aedion, wait.”  He broke off immediately, though couldn’t stop the low growl of frustration.  Mikkal grinned.  “Come on.”  Aedion resisted being dragged out of the shadows, pulling Mikkal in closer and kissing him until he pulled away again.  “Nobody ever died because they had to keep their pants on for a few minutes.”  
  
“There’s a first time for everything.  Do you want to take that chance?”  He followed Mikkal towards his rooms, soon passing him and grabbing his hand to pull him along faster.  They were laughing like schoolchildren as they crashed through his small house and into his bedroom.  The door had barely clicked shut behind them before Aedion had shoved Mikkal against it and dropped to his knees.  
  
The guttural moan Mikkal made as Aedion took him into his mouth was almost enough to shred Aedion’s shaky self control.  The fingers curling in his hair, the way that long body leaned back against the door, the complete and utter surrender… When Mikkal went suddenly still, Aedion knew he was close to his release and upped his tempo, working his tongue over the broad smooth head of him, listening for that telltale hitch of breath.    
  
When Mikkal’s shuddering climax was over and he was limp against the door, Aedion kissed his way up his body before scooping him up in his arms.  Mikkal laughed under his breath as he was swung onto the bed, and he grabbed Aedion’s face in his hands and drew him down on top of him for a kiss.  Before Aedion could roll him, Mikkal hooked his foot around his ankles and surged upwards, flipping them both with an ease that shocked a laugh out of Aedion.  He wondered briefly how much Mikkal held himself back, how much he hid, but that thought fled along with all others as his clothes were stripped from him and that clever mouth took him in.  
  
It was sweet torture to remain on his back, to keep his movements small and allow Mikkal to control the rhythm.  Every sweep of his tongue, every careful graze of his teeth heightened the sensation until the pleasure was very nearly pain.  When the climax finally hit it was in overwhelming waves, and as it passed he was startled and a little embarrassed to realize he was blinking back tears.  Not that Mikkal seemed to care as he crawled up and collapsed against him.    
  
They lay in their standard position, Mikkal’s head on his shoulder, one arm resting on his ribs, one leg wrapped between his.  After a few minutes, Aedion pressed his lips gently against that silky black hair.  Mikkal’s arm tightened in response and he said sleepily, “Just give me a moment.  Then you can have your way with me.”  
  
Aedion gave a breathless laugh and kissed his hair again.  He must have dozed off for a little bit, because suddenly he was awake and aware Mikkal was watching him.  Reaching up, he brushed his thumb against his cheek.  Mikkal closed his eyes and leaned into the touch.  “What am I going to do?” Aedion murmured, and Mikkal’s breath caught and his face tightened.  After a long moment, those clear amber eyes opened, and Aedion’s own breathing hitched at the expression in them.   
  
“You’re going to be fine,” Mikkal said fiercely.  “You’ll be in Terrasen by spring.  You’ll be home.  And you’ll be able to keep your vow.”  
  
“But you won’t be with me,” Aedion whispered.  
  
“You don’t need me.  You’ll move on.”  
  
“How can you say that?”  
  
The smile Mikkal gave as he brushed Aedion’s hair back off his forehead was heartbreaking.  “Because everyone always does.”  
  
Aedion didn’t know what to say.  He didn’t know how many people Mikkal had let go before him, how many he had loved.  Maybe it really was that inevitable.  Maybe Mikkal would go south, and he would go north, and in a few months this would seem like nothing but a fading dream.  He drew Mikkal to him again.  If it was all just going to be a dream, it might as well be a good one.    
  
*****  
  
A while later, as they lay tangled up in each other, still panting, Aedion whispered in Mikkal’s ear, “What about you?  What are you going to do all the way down there in Fenharrow?”  
  
He was silent for a long time.  “You don’t need to worry about me.  I’ll be all right.”  He wondered if Aedion could smell the lie.  
  
*****  
  
The light filtering into Delaney’s window touched her awake.  She didn’t know how long she had been in her room, how many days or weeks had passed since the world had been smothered in a gray haze with the realization that Raedan was gone.  This morning, she felt…clear.  Empty, hollow, but clear.  She swung her feet out of bed, pressed them to the cold floor, and rose, stiff and shaky.  Her chest still hurt, as sharp as if she were the one who had taken the blade, and it took her a long time to cross the room and open the doors to her wardrobe.  There were too many clothes in there, it was too hard to pick something, so she sat on the corner of her desk for a while, just staring.  Eventually she grabbed trousers and a shirt at random and pulled them on before creeping down the stairs.    
  
Her appearance in the breakfast room caused a bit of a stir.  The housekeeper seemed inclined to make a fuss, but at a glance from Clery settled for pouring her tea and putting a sweet bun on her plate.  Delaney picked at the food and sipped at the tea without tasting any of it.  It fell into the hollow spot and sat there like a brick.  Clery shook out a paper and started to read, glancing up at her occasionally.    
  
“I want to do something,” she said abruptly, her voice unfamiliar to her own ears.    
  
Clery set the paper down slowly.  “All right.  What did you have in mind?”  
  
She hadn’t thought that far ahead.  “I don’t know.”  
  
He looked her up and down.  “Start by taking a bath.  Then we can talk more.”  
  
She soaked in the bath long enough that the water was nearly cold before she rose to towel off.  It was most peculiar; she knew her eyes were open, but time passed in great leaps as if she were asleep.  The brush tangled in her shoulder-length hair and she started to yank at it when a knock sounded at the door, and the housekeeper entered.    
  
“Here, honey, let me help you.”  She gently freed the brush and began working at her hair.  “You know, you can talk to any one of us if you ever want to.  You don’t have to; do what you need to, my dear.  We’re here.”  
  
Delaney nodded mutely.  She didn’t know what to say, didn’t think there was anything in her to say.  When the housekeeper was done and her hair was as smooth as it got these days, she dressed in fresh clothes somebody had selected for her and headed to Clery’s study.    
  
He studied her for a moment, then handed her a paper.  A letter from Fulke, in which he stated that he had found his beloved young cousin a job in a bakery in Rifthold, and she could join him there whenever she wished.  Delaney read it twice and then handed it back to him.  “Do you still wish to help us?” he asked quietly.  
  
“Yes,” she said, surprising herself.  “I think…yes.”  
  
“I need you to be certain.”  
  
She nodded.  “What Adarlan did…what it’s doing, it’s not right.  And if it hadn’t conquered, hadn’t destroyed everything, hadn’t killed so many people, then Rae…my brother would still be…”  The tears that had been absent for days welled up fresh.  
  
Clery walked around the desk and gathered her up in a hug.  “War is hell, and it is always the innocent who suffer the most.”  He hesitated for a long moment.  “Aisnir’s son went to the butchering blocks because he had magic.  It doesn’t make what he did right, not by any means, but his son was as undeserving of his fate as your brother.”  Delaney nodded.   “That is what we’re trying to do.  We’re trying to find ways to protect the innocent, so if you’re truly willing to be my eyes and ears -”  
  
“I am.”  
  
“Then let’s get you ready.”  
  
*****  
  
They were down to three more mornings of waking up together.  Not that Aedion was counting, or trying desperately to hold onto each precious minute.  Only three more days of laughing and training and eating together; three nights of having Mikkal there to soothe his nightmares, to sing to him, his voice a tether keeping the crushing black from sweeping him away.    
  
When Mikkal moved to get out of bed Aedion dragged him back in, kissing his back and neck until he surrendered, laughing.  As they lay for a moment, Mikkal half on top of him, a memory triggered from the night before.  “How come you never spar with me?” Aedion asked.    
  
Mikkal freed himself and turned to face him.  “Because I’m not an idiot.”  
  
“But last night you were able to flip me easily.”  
  
“I hardly think one effective maneuver when you weren’t expecting it means I could hold my own against you in the ring,” he replied drily.  “Especially given which brain you were using in that moment.”    
  
Aedion laughed.  “It wouldn’t have to be hand-to-hand.  If you were to spar with me, what weapon would you choose?”  
  
“Probably sword.”  
  
Aedion was surprised.  He’d seen Mikkal handle the bow and knives when helping out in training, but had never seen him so much as lift a sword.  “Why?”  
  
One black eyebrow went up.  “Because it’s the only weapon I might be able to occupy you with for more than 30 seconds.”  
  
“Really?”    
  
“Yes, you arrogant bastard.”  His affectionate tone eliminated any sting from the words, and he bent down to kiss him before escaping the bed for good.    
  
Aedion followed him into the bathing room.  “Will you spar with me?”  
  
Mikkal looked at him in disbelief.  “This is so important to you that you have to watch me pee?”  Aedion just waited.  “Fine.  I’ll spar with you.”  
  
“Today?”  
  
“If you insist.”  
  
Aedion began questioning his decision to push the matter when he walked towards the pitch a few hours later and saw every single officer in camp waiting.  Their gleeful expressions as they watched him approaching gave him pause.  He stopped next to Mikkal.  “What are they all doing here?”  
  
“They just want to see me get my ass handed to me, I imagine.  General’s son and all.”  He said it casually, but there was a faint gleam in his eyes.    
  
“Why do I doubt that?”    
  
Mikkal shrugged, and began unbuttoning his jacket.  “Are we doing an exhibition here, or are we actually fighting?” he asked, hand on his dagger belt.  
  
“Fighting.”  He took his own jacket off and dropped it on the browning grass next to Mikkal’s.  
  
“Sword and dagger, then.”  Aedion nodded, and Mikkal left the belt in place.  Side by side, they strode onto the pitch and faced each other.    
  
“I’ll call time,” said Major Ivry from where he stood on the edge of the pitch.  Mikkal nodded his agreement, and Aedion was a bit surprised to see a feral smile beginning to spread on that well-loved face as he drew his sword.    
  
Ivry whistled, and they began.  Mikkal’s initial aggression forced Aedion onto his back foot.  Unlike most fighters who take the first rush, Mikkal didn’t immediately lunge, but feinted to Aedion’s left then, anticipating the block, spun and swung his dagger at his exposed right.  Aedion parried the blow easily, but it was an unusual maneuver and he eyed Mikkal warily as he shifted to the offensive.  Mikkal kept his footwork pristine as he backpedaled, his parrying blow hard enough Aedion felt the reverberations in his teeth.  He snarled, and Mikkal gave a short laugh as he danced around and struck again.    
  
The fight dragged on, the seconds passing into minutes, until they were both panting and flushed, sweating through their shirts.  Aedion had never fought someone with Mikkal’s speed, he realized; nor someone with that long of a reach, almost equal to his own.  He found himself tapping into his fae strength, trying to disarm him, and finally Mikkal’s grip on his sword seemed to weaken.  He stepped in to trap the sword with his own weapons - and felt a burn snake up his forearm as the tip of Mikkal’s dagger struck through his sleeve.  
  
“Time!” yelled Ivry.  Aedion wasn’t sure if the five minutes had actually passed, or if it was called because any bloodletting was considered the end of a sparring session.  
  
“Shit!”  Aedion stared down at his arm in shock as Mikkal sheathed his weapons.  It was just a scratch, but he didn’t remember the last time someone had managed to draw blood on him with a weapon.  The battle where he was captured, probably.  There was a roar of noise all around him, and he looked up to see every single officer applauding.   
  
“Come on,” Mikkal said, “let’s walk around for a minute or we’re both going to cramp up.”  Aedion followed him, ignoring the men who clapped them on the shoulders as they passed.    
  
“That was the best fight I’ve ever seen,” Ivry said, grinning from ear to ear as he joined them.  “Gods, man, you fight dirty, Paget.”  
  
Mikkal laughed.  “I’ve got to use any advantage I can going up against this one.”  
  
“How was that dirty?” Aedion asked.  
  
Ivry smile got wider, if that was possible.  “Did you really think he lost his grip?”  He patted Aedion on the shoulder, a little condescendingly, and jogged back to the rest of the men.  
  
Aedion stopped, sputtering, “Are you…did you…is he…”  
  
Mikkal’s face was abruptly dead serious.  “You’re still holding back, Aedion.”  He shook his head.  “There is only one reason why I was able to stay on that pitch with you today.  And that’s because you are still not fighting with your heart.  You’re so used to outmatching everyone you go up against that you never reach the depths of your reserves.    
  
“You underestimated me today, just like I thought you would.  Don’t do it again.  Not with me, not with anybody.  It’ll get you killed.”  Mikkal started walking again, then paused and turned after a few feet when he realized Aedion wasn’t behind him.  His face was flushed, his hair clinging to his sweaty forehead, his eyes still glowing with the aftermath of adrenaline from the fight.  He looked like he did right after he came.  Aedion had never wanted him more than he did in that moment, and Mikkal seemed to sense it.  He walked back, a sensual smile playing on his lips.  “Now’s not the time,” he murmured, “half he camp is watching us.  Let’s keep walking then get some water.”  
  
They walked in silence around half the pitch.  “You set this all up, didn’t you.”  
  
Mikkal looked at him out of the corner of his eye.  “You’re pretty predictable.”  Aedion growled.  “Though I didn’t expect you to take this long to ask to spar.”  
  
“It never really occurred to me.  You don’t seem…”  
  
“Like a fighter?”  His voice was bitter.  “Just because I hate it doesn’t mean I’m not good at it.”  
  
“You didn’t hate it today.”  
  
“No, I suppose not.”  Mikkal sighed.  “I don’t hate it in the moment.  It’s the aftermath that bothers me.”  The bulk of the officers had dispersed by the time they were approaching again, but the remainder had been joined by their charges for training.  Aedion held back his reply as he recognized his own men and realized he needed stay to assist.  He took the gentle ribbing from the soldiers with a grin, but couldn’t keep his eyes from straying to Mikkal walking off the pitch, head bowed.    
  
*****  
  
The next two days passed in a haze, Mikkal’s only clear memories being fighting and fucking.  He knew he spent time with his mother; knew he visited Raedan in the infirmary; knew he must have eaten and slept and gone to meetings.  But all he could recall was Aedion.    
  
After that spectacular session on the pitch, Aedion had insisted on working with him and the sword as much as possible before he left.  The truth was, there wasn’t anything he could teach him about the moves or the handling of a weapon; it was ruthlessness Aedion needed to learn, and Mikkal wasn’t sure he could teach that.  Not to the man he loved.  Not when Mikkal himself was regretting every wound he’d ever inflicted, every life he’d ever taken; when all their faces had become Aedion’s, or his mother’s.   
  
The night before he left, he went to see his father.  The general was in his study, as he always was in the evening.  Mikkal knocked and entered on his father’s command, and was surprised to see his father grinning at him from the other side of his desk.  
  
“That was a hell of a fight, son,” General Paget said by way of greeting.    
  
“I didn’t know you saw it,” Mikkal replied, sitting down in the chair opposite him.  
  
 His father studied him for a moment.  “You’ve gotten stronger.”  
  
Mikkal huffed a quiet laugh.  “It would be hard to train Ashryver for five months and not get stronger.”  
  
“Fair enough, fair enough.  You all set for your trip?”  Mikkal nodded, not quite able to meet his eye.  He hated this.  Hated the fact that he knew deep in his bones that this would be the last time he sat in this study, the last time those gray eyes would fix on him, always seeing more than he wanted.  
  
“I’m…sorry, son,” his father said, quite gently for him.  Mikkal looked at him in surprise.  “I know it’s hard for you to leave.  Your mother told me you talked to her?”  
  
“I’m afraid for him,” he said, not quite an answer but a truth he needed to share.  “He’s too careful, still.  That’s why I beat him the other day, you know.”  
  
“And you don’t think that’s just because it was you?”  
  
“It could be, but I don’t think so.  I pissed him off on purpose, you see.  And he fought harder against me than he has against anyone else since he’d been here.”    
  
The general nodded thoughtfully.  “You’re more skilled than he’s used to, though.  And if he hadn’t seen you train, he wouldn’t have had a reason to know that.”  
  
“Yes, but that’s my concern.  He starts from a point of underestimating his opponent, of trying to match their skill instead of just fighting his fight.  And I don’t know how to fix that.”  
  
“You can’t.”  One corner of the general’s lips quirked up.  “Don’t give me that look, son.  You can’t fix it, nobody can but him.  He’ll figure it out in battle soon enough.”  
  
“But what if he doesn’t?  At least, not in time?”  
  
His father shook his head, expression softer than he’d ever seen it.  “You can’t protect him from himself, Mikkal.  No matter how much you love him.”  Looking at the grief and understanding in those wise gray eyes, Mikkal realized his father was not really talking about Aedion.  
  
*****  
  
Delaney heard voices in the study when she entered the townhouse.  The last few days had settled into a routine, and she was slowly beginning to remember who she had been.  That first day, she had gone and spoken with Mabina.  The seamstress had been so kind it felt like she was talking to a different person than the bitter taskmaster she’d become accustomed to.  Then again, now Delaney understood.  They could speak the common language of loss.  
  
The past few days she had gone back to Ea’s bakery.  It had made sense, since that would be the role she’d be playing in a month or so.  She was grateful, too, for the return to something she had been good at, had enjoyed.  It made getting through each day a little easier.   
  
Not wanting to deal with whoever Clery was talking to, she started up the stairs to her room, hoping to sneak past the study on her way.  She cringed when he called her name, and slunk back to stand in the doorway.  
  
The visitor was Turi, one of the other messengers Clery employed.  She hadn’t seen him for a while, perhaps only once or twice since her messenger duties had ceased.  Clery’s face was glowing, and Turi looked confused, a feeling Delaney found herself sharing.    
  
“Delaney, Turi’s got some information for you.”  Clery’s voice was nearly shaking with excitement.    
  
Turi stood and gave her a small bow, which served to confuse her further.  “I was told to tell you, miss, that Raedan is safe, that he got to a healer in time.”  He looked at her in some alarm.  “Miss?  Are you all right?”    
  
The room tilted, then Clery was there, supporting her, guiding her into a chair.  She raised a shaking hand to her mouth.  “What did you say?” she whispered.  
  
“Why don’t you tell her the whole thing, Turi,” Clery suggested.  
  
So he did.  He told her every detail of his ride, and his encounter with the drunk in the tavern and then with Aedion.  Every word he said had the ring of truth.  This time, when he repeated Aedion’s message, she let herself believe it, and the tears began to fall.  
  
*****  
  
Aedion had no intention of sleeping this last night.  Mikkal came back from the meeting with the general a little pale, and Aedion had hesitated, not wanting to press him.  But Mikkal had practically attacked him, literally ripping his shirt off as he shoved him back onto the bed.  Mikkal’s clothes suffered similarly.  Aedion was not gentle when he flipped Mikkal onto his knees, was not careful as he joined them, yet Mikkal cried out for more more more and Aedion responded.   With his hands and his mouth and his cock, he responded, until Mikkal was shuddering underneath him with the force of his climax.  Then Aedion pulled him up against his chest and bit down on his neck, hard enough to bruise, needing to mark him as he had their very first time together.   And like that first time, as he went over the edge with his teeth still buried in Mikkal’s skin, there was grief staining the pleasure, though this time he at least knew why.  
  
Afterwards they lay face to face, so close they were sharing breath, their whole bodies pressed against each other, Mikkal’s fingers tracing his ear, his jaw, his cheek, his mouth.  “I need you to promise me something,” Mikkal murmured.  
  
“Anything.”  
  
“I need you to promise me that you will learn how to lie.”  
  
“What?”  Aedion pulled back a fraction, so he could better read Mikkal’s face.  
  
“I need you to learn how to lie.  To do what you plan…you’re too honest.”   
  
Aedion didn’t know how to respond.  “What makes you think I’m planning something?”  
  
“Like I said, I’m not an idiot.  I’ve seen enough.  You came back from the forest missing two of your daggers, Aedion, and that man in town…You’re planning to do what I lack the balls for.  But to pull it off, to do it without being caught by the King, you’ll need to have both sides fooled.”  It was true; he’d thought the same thing himself.  “And they’re going to hate you for it, Aedion.  The people you’re doing this for…if you do it right, they’re going to hate you.”  
  
“I know.”  It was a sacrifice he was more than willing to make, if it could help keep his people safe.  
  
Mikkal kissed him then, and Aedion couldn’t tell whose tears he was tasting on those perfect lips.  
  
*****  
  
A little after sunrise, a tall black-haired man rode through the gates of the camp, letting his horse pick his way down the hill.  He knew the road he had to travel, and his mind was not on what lay ahead but on what he was leaving behind.  The only three people in the world he loved remained behind those walls.  He had left with those three words unsaid to the one who mattered the most.  He had tried to show it with every kiss and touch, with every song sung to chase away the darkness, but if he had said them, had heard them in return, he never would have been able to leave.  The road was gilded with the light as he reached the flat and touched his horse into an easy canter, but all he could see was empty blackness yawning before him.    
  
He never knew that a young golden haired lieutenant stood alone in a watchtower, watching him leave, whispering his name, praying to whatever gods there still were that they would find their way back to each other.


	13. Chapter 13

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Some canon-typical violence and self-harm.

Delaney reached the top of the hill and pulled Horse to a stop.  A light snow had been falling off and on for hours, and the scene before her belonged in one of the paintings in Clery’s parlor.  Below her lay the lights of the city, sprawling along the curve of the river that from here was a broad gray streak.  Far off the distance, she could see the castle rising up, towering above the smaller buildings, bluish gray in the dim light that filtered through the clouds.  It looked strange and fragile compared to the white beauty of Orynth.  Turi had told her it was made of glass, as bizarre as that seemed; she wondered how it was even possible to build a structure that size from glass.  Having watched the glassblowers in Orynth a time or two, she smiled at the image of a giant as big as the continent blowing through a pipe the size of the river below, spinning and crimping to build the form.    
  
She had finally reached Rifthold.  It had taken weeks for her to master the letter-writing codes well enough to please Clery.  He had found her a group of merchants to travel with, deeming that safer than her traveling as a lone woman, no matter how many times she had pointed out she’d made it to Orynth on her own.  In the end she was grateful; it was much more pleasant to camp with the others than it would have been alone, and they helped shield her from the occasional patrols as well.    
  
One of the merchants rode up next to her.  “What do you think?”  
  
“It’s beautiful,” Delaney said.  
  
Margite snorted.  “Only from afar, believe me.  Once you’re down there, the smell alone is enough to make you forget all about this view.”  
  
“Oh, wonderful.”  
  
“At least you’re working in a bakery, that should help mask it,” the young merchant said, grinning, as she turned her horse to start the twisting road down the hill.  Delaney followed, and they soon caught up with the others.  Horse had the peculiar habit of sliding down hills on his hindquarters.  Delaney had not realized this was unusual, but it had caused quite a lot of alarm among the merchants until she explained it was just his way.  They slid past Margite and Rou, and finally caught up with Coline and Olivyi at the bottom.  Horse stood and shook his sparse mane, obviously quite proud of himself.    
  
Coline laughed.  “I’m going to miss the two of you,” she said in her honey-sweet voice that could convince a milliner to buy a hat - and did, regularly.  “I wish you could keep traveling with us.”  
  
Delaney smiled.  “I hardly think I’d be much of an asset, I couldn’t sell bread to a starving man.”  
  
“Don’t tell your new employer that,” Olivyi quipped.    
  
“Thankfully, I don’t think they expect me to sell it, just bake it.  That I can manage.”  
  
They were near the gates, where she counted three guards perusing everyone who passed.  There wasn’t a line; whether that was due to the weather or the approaching nightfall she didn’t know.  The men seemed bored, barely scanning the five of them on horseback, only stopping Julot the driver with the wagon full of goods.  They paused, waiting for the inspection to finish, Delaney allowing Horse to pick at the sparse grass as payment for getting them there safely.  When one of the guards thumped on the wagon, she tugged up his head and they headed into the city proper.  
  
It was enormous, much larger than Orynth, but it lacked the classic majesty of the white city.  The main road ran parallel to the river though several blocks away, and Margite had not been joking about the smell.  Dead fish odor permeated everything, though some neighborhoods blended that with the even more delightful smells of fetid piss and garbage.  She hoped she’d get used to it in time, but for now, she wrinkled her nose and the others laughed.  After a while, they reached the market district.  There, though they were right along the river, the smells of coffee, bread, and spices outcompeted the less pleasant odors from the river.  The road opened up before them into a large square.  It was deserted at the moment, all of the stalls coated in a layer of fine powdery snow, and starkly beautiful with the lights from the castle hovering over it all.    
  
Rou led them through the square and towards the warehouses at the far end.  There, the merchants unloaded the wagon into their reserved area with the efficiency that comes from long practice.  Delaney helped where she could, mostly just getting underfoot and sliding around on the slick cobbles.  Finally, Julot unhitched the horses and he, Rou, and Olivyi backed the wagon in before pulling the door closed and padlocking it.  
  
They dropped the horses at the stable of the boarding house where the merchants would be staying and began walking through the section of the market square that contained most of the bakeries.  There were still lights on in most of the windows, people inside working in preparation for the approaching solstice celebration.  When they reached the address Delaney had been given, there were lights on but the door was locked.  Suddenly she was glad for her small posse of merchants.  She hesitated briefly before knocking, and Coline gave her shoulder a quick squeeze.  Taking a deep breath, she squared her shoulders and raised her hand.  
  
A rap on the glass door had a black-haired, red-cheeked young woman poking her head through an interior door, then scurrying over to open it.  “We’re closed,” she said politely, “but we’ll be open first thing tomorrow morning.  Is there something  that you’re looking for?”  
  
“I’m Delaney,” she said, feeling like an utter idiot when the woman looked at her blankly.  “Um, my cousin Fulke spoke with someone here about a job for me?”  
  
At Fulke’s name, the other woman’s face had cleared.  “Ah yes, welcome, Delaney.  I’m Lina.  Would your friends like to come in?”  Delaney looked around to them, wondering if her panic showed on her face.    
  
Margite gave her a hug.  “You’ll be fine,” she said.  “We’ll come by tomorrow, see how you’re making out.  And you know where we’re staying.”  Delaney nodded.  “Good luck my friend.”  
  
This was echoed by the rest of them, and Delaney murmured her thanks.  It wasn’t enough; she owed them so much more. After the emotional whirlwind she had been on for the past eight months, their easy acceptance of her into their ranks had somehow made the ground under her feet more steady even as the terrain had changed from the rugged forests of pine and rock near Orynth to the broad plains of grass in northern Adarlan.   This trip had been the first time she had truly been able to see how varied and lovely this world was; almost her whole life had been spent in the training camp, and on her trip to Orynth she had seldom been able to feel easy enough to just…look.  Margite and Coline, and Rou and Olivyi and even silent Julot - they had given her that.  
  
With a deep breath, she smiled through the tears that burned her eyes and waved as they left.  Turning back to Lina, she was ready to apologize for making the woman wait but she saw such a softness in her round face that she knew the apology was unnecessary.  “Thank you for understanding,” she said instead.    
  
Lina smiled.  “Good friends are always a blessing,” she replied, stepping back holding the door open.  “Come on in.”  
  
The bakery was new and familiar at the same time.  The warm, rich, yeasty and sweet smell swamped her and she breathed in deep.  The small store at the front opened into a large bustling workspace in the back, at least double the size of Ea’s.  A dozen men and women of a wide range of ages were scattered through the space, and there was flour floating in the sweltering air.  Everyone looked up as Delaney followed Lina into the room, and there were quick smiles of greeting all around before they returned to their work.    
  
“You came at a bit of an awkward time,” Lina said apologetically.  “With solstice in a couple of days, we’re really busy.  I can quickly show you where your room is, so you can get some rest, and I can show you the ropes in the morning if you like.”  
  
Delaney shook her head.  “No, I’ll help, just tell me where I can put my stuff and wash up.”  
  
Lina gratefully took her to the small wash room and she quickly washed her face and hands and put her hair up in a knot before rejoining the other bakers.  An older man with a pleasant open face called her over and, after a few questions, directed her to a station to roll out and bake cookies.  In what seemed like no time, there were dozens of perfectly golden cookies cooling on racks and Delaney was wiping the sweat from her flushed face.    
  
The older man approached and surveyed the cookies, gently touching one to test the texture, then picking it up and breaking it in half.  “These are perfect,” he said, nibbling on one half while handing the other to her.  “Luk.”  
  
“Delaney,” she replied, taking the cookie then shaking his outstretched hand.  
  
“Welcome to Rifthold, Delaney.”  
  
*****  
  
“Again.”  
  
Aedion spun his sword in his hand, eyeing the officers who faced him.  In the two months since Mikkal had left, he had been working as much as he could drag his pathetic ass down to the pitch.  A number of his fellow officers had taken it upon themselves to try to beat the shit out of him regularly.  They generally failed, though when it was three on one - he glared at Ivry, Bellamy, and Levett - they certainly could make him sweat for it.  Somehow, even Colonel Sayre, General Paget’s right-hand man, had gotten involved, and it was he who was calling for them to repeat the exercise.  
  
He was exhausted, though he wouldn’t admit it.  Each night, his dreams drove him from sleep; he had finally stopped reaching for that warm male body, finally stopped hoping for that beautiful voice to begin singing while strong arms wrapped around him.  So instead he read, now devouring books about history and strategy rather than the silliness he had previously favored.  
  
Ivry, Bellamy, and Levett got set, and Aedion lifted his sword, but before they went Sayre called out, “Wait.”  Everyone relaxed, and Sayre limped over to Aedion.  “I’ve been watching you for weeks now, boy,” he said, loudly enough for the others to hear, “and I want to see you fight like you would in battle.”  Aedion looked at him in surprise.  “You’re plenty well-schooled in all the techniques, but as far as I can tell you lack the ability to put an opponent down and keep ‘em there.  Prove me wrong.”  
  
“I could hurt somebody,” Aedion said.  
  
Sayre nodded thoughtfully.  “True.”  He turned to the other officers, and they all nodded back.  “Just try to stay your killing blow.”  
  
_At least they’re all wearing armor_ , Aedion thought, as he hefted his sword and his shield.  The armor and the shield were on Sayre’s insistence, and had become standard protocol when he trained.  The latter was because it had been determined Aedion was sloppy with protection, that if he was on a battlefield where there were archers he would need to be able to use it.  He still preferred fighting with two blades, but perhaps…perhaps he was underestimating the usefulness of the shield.  
  
Bellamy charged first, and Aedion parried, then slammed the shield into him, knocking him off his feet and sending his sword flying, before spinning to counter Ivry.  Ivry was too quick, too balanced on his feet for the same maneuver to work, and they clashed, then circled.  When Aedion heard Levett come at his blind side, he lunged at Ivry, pushing him onto his back foot, before spinning to counter Levett with his shield.  A blow from the fist holding hilt of his sword against Levett’s temple dropped him to the ground, and Aedion turned back to Ivry.  For the first time since they’d met, Ivry looked unnerved, but he didn’t pause, just continued on the offensive.  In a few more moves, Ivry was disarmed, and Aedion stopped.    
  
Bellamy was still on the ground, though he’d managed to roll onto his hands and knees.  Levett was out cold; Sayre and Aedion both rushed to check on him, Aedion sheathing his sword as he moved.  “Well, he’s breathing,” Sayre said grimly.  Levett blinked, then groaned, bringing his arm up to shield his eyes from the light.  Aedion moved to fetch the healer, but looked up to see Raedan already returning with her in tow.  He hadn’t even realized Raedan had been among the gathered watchers, though he wasn’t surprised.  
  
“Levett,” Sayre said quietly, “can you hear me?”  
  
“Mmhmm,” Levett responded, still not taking his arm away from his eyes.    
  
The healer arrived then and bent over him, talking quietly.  After a few minutes, he rose to his feet, a little unsteadily, and Aedion was right there, helping him as they walked slowly off the field.  When they reached the infirmary, Aedion lifted Levett and set him gently in one of the beds.  “I’m sorry,” he said, as the healer disappeared to grab a tonic.  
  
“For what?” Levett croaked, trying to smile.  “Not your fault I’m slow.”  
  
Before he could respond, the healer was there shooing him out.  When he turned to leave, Sayre was right behind him, and they walked out together.  “The only thing you did wrong, boy,” the colonel said once they were back outside, “is apologize.”  He clapped Aedion on his armored back before heading off towards his office.  
  
Aedion shook his head in disbelief, then headed towards Ivry’s house.  He couldn’t stop his hand from slipping into his pocket and touching the worn, folded paper that lay there.  He had been carrying it around since he had found it, tucked deep into his saddle bag, about two weeks after Mikkal had left.  He didn’t need to pull it out to read it.  When he closed his eyes, that elegant flowing script was all he could see.  
  
_Dearest Aedion,_  
  
_There was so much I should have told you and didn’t.  I don’t think you have any idea how brilliant you truly are.  You need to be willing to embrace every part of you, if you are going to achieve what you hope to.  Your heritage is a blessing.  Don’t fear it.  Your strength, your speed - these things will save you._  
  
_We never really spoke much of your family, but I know what was done to them.  And I can guess by whom.  You have the strength, the courage, and the intelligence to do what needs to be done.  I wish I could be there to help you, to see you set things right at last.  For I have every faith you will do so, and no matter where I am, I will know - and be proud of you._  
  
_I am grateful that the gods saw fit to let us have each other, even if it was only for a few months.  I see now that this was why they spared me; that they denied all my prayers while I was in Fenharrow so that I could have the joy of knowing you.  Now that I am going back into that hell,  know that no matter what my thoughts will always be of you._  
  
_With love,_  
_Mikkal_  
  
When he had first read this, he had been angry, so angry, with himself as well as with Mikkal.  The last paragraph - he should have known.  Should have understood the shadows he had seen lurking in those amber eyes.  Mikkal had hinted at it enough, but he had been too caught up in everything, too happy, to recognize it.  But Mikkal…he should have told him.  
  
Perhaps that shared pain, those shared unanswered prayers for death, were what had drawn them to each other.  
  
Now, softened by the intervening weeks, he clung to the first paragraph.  That and the memory of their last night were what dragged him out from his tangled sheets each morning, what pushed him to pick up the weapons that had become so heavy.  For though he was learning all he could about strategy, he was no closer to figuring out how to actually pull off his plans.    
  
He had received his promotion to Captain a few weeks ago, a necessary step before he could be sent into Terrasen with a company of his own.  It was the weather that kept him where he was, as the snow coming down from the Staghorns would be making the roads challenging at best farther north.  Here they had had a few snowfalls, but the sun had returned in between to melt it away.  In Perranth, or Orynth, they would not be so lucky.  He didn’t know to which city he would be sent first.  Orynth was four times the size of Perranth, and contained the majority of the lords who still lived and likely most of the rebels.  On the other hand, Perranth was more securely under Adarlan control, given that that piece-of-shit Vernon had surrendered completely to the King of Adarlan after he gave his own brother and niece over to the butchering blocks.  
  
This was what should have been occupying his thoughts, but at the moment, he just wanted to find some release.  The fight was over so quickly that it had just whetted his appetite, especially since he had finally loosened the tight leash he kept on himself.  He knocked on Ivry’s door and was welcomed in by Mrs. Ivry, who promptly handed him tiny Morghanna and went to get her husband.  He emerged fresh from his bath a few minutes later, smiling a bit at the sight of his daughter being cradled in Aedion’s huge hands.  
  
“I could use a ride into town,” Aedion said quietly,  not wanting to wake the sleeping baby.  “Any errands I can run for you?”  
  
Ivry was more than happy to hand him a list, and Aedion was off after transferring Morghanna carefully to her father.  Avenar sensed his mood, and kicked up her heels as he let her into a gallop once they hit the road.  Once they hit the town, he tied her and completed his errands before allowing his feet to carry him towards The Sow’s Ear.  The small tavern was at the far end of town from the inn, and had a rather different clientele.  He dodged drunken dancers before landing at the bar, accepting his glass of ale from the curvy bartender.  Lizabet gave him a wink, and he sipped slowly, watching her and the other staff serving the patrons, waiting for her signal.  When she tapped on the bar and the brown-haired woman took her place, he rose from his stool and walked out into the alley.  
  
It was the ale - far superior to that of the inn - that had first brought him here, but it was the bartender that kept him coming back.  That first visit, she had dropped a note in front of him inviting him to meet her in the alley during her break.  He had been a bit startled when she had declined his offer of a visit to the inn, instead talking him through taking her against the brick wall of the tavern.  Now it was a regular occurrence, with him finding excuses to make it into town multiple times per week.    
  
Lizabet was waiting behind the tavern, and they lost no time.  As he covered her mouth with his, she unbuttoned his pants, freeing the arousal that had sprung the moment he’d stepped out of the building, then lifted her skirts.  He picked her up with one arm under her ass and the other supporting her shoulders, and she reached between them to guide him into her.  It was a matter of a few thrusts before she was moaning into his mouth, a few more before he felt her core clenching around him.  He found his release not long after, ignoring the hollow feeling that always persisted despite the waves of pleasure coursing through his body.    
  
As she was straightening her skirts, he asked, “How long do you have?”  Sometimes they could manage another session.  
  
“I need to get back,” she said with a smirk, “but I can send one of the other girls out.”  She had offered this a number of times, and he had taken her up on it once or twice, but he shook his head.  The door closed behind her, and he turned and headed back to Avenar.  On the ride home, he couldn’t fight the wave of shame that washed over him.  It had not been that long since Mikkal had left, and he couldn’t stop rutting like a tomcat in an alley.  He cursed his lack of self control.  Yet he knew in two days, or three, he’d be back there.  It was a pale imitation of making love, but at least it was a few minutes of feigned closeness.  
  
Once he was back in his room, he pulled out a sheet of paper and a pen.  As he had every week for the past two months, he began to write.  
  
_Dearest Mikkal_ …  
  
*****  
  
The hammering outside was driving into Mikkal’s brain.  The camp he was at, that had begun as a temporary holding during the initial push into Fenharrow, was being made permanent.  The dining hall, kitchens, infirmary, and main house were already built.  Now the barracks were going up, at his insistence.  The original plan had been to build the officers’ houses first, but he pointed out that it was much more efficient to build one large building to house the barracks, and the officers could always bunk in if they wished to get out of the tents.  It had been the first time he had pushed back a bit against General Chambers.  Since he had been careful to do it behind closed doors it had been accepted, if not with grace, at least with grudging respect.  
  
He just wished it wasn’t being built right next to his gods-damned tent.  But then, the general was entitled to his bit of revenge.  
  
“Major Paget?”  One of the pages entered with a stack of letters for him, and he nodded to the corner of his desk then thanked the boy for setting them there.  Finishing up his report, he leaned back in his char, studying the pile of envelopes.  Taking a deep breath, he reached for it.  
  
The first few were the expected responses from some of his fellow officers at nearby camps, concerning his inquiries regarding the welfare of the locals caught between the rebels and Adarlan’s forces.  There was a letter in his father’s strong hand.  And then - there it was.  Aedion’s scrawl.  Starting at the top, he read through, making notes about where the farms and markets were still thriving, and where they were burned out or gone fallow. The latter list was far longer.  He shook his head as he jotted down the last few names; he needed to present this to General Chambers.  It was vital to get food to the regions where the farms and markets were gone as soon as possible.  
      
His father had written primarily to congratulate him on his promotion to major.  There were little bits of information about the camp; his mother was enjoying her time watching the Ivry’s baby, evidently Raedan Lamar had made a full recovery, and Major Bellamy was engaged to a girl from his hometown.  And at the end:  _Ashryver continues to work with Colonel Sayre as you had suggested.  We will be putting together a small company of men to accompany him in the spring, when we expect him to begin to rally a force in the north_.    
  
Lastly, he reached for Aedion’s letter.  He just held it for several long minutes, fingers tracing the letters that made up his name.  Sighing, he flipped it over and broke the seal.  His heart cracked anew as he read.  Each of these letters had the same effect.  After the first one, that had been so crackling with anger and pain he had barely been able to finish it, he had actually put in for a transfer back north.  It had been denied, and even though he told himself that was expected, the only thing that kept his dagger from plunging into his own skin was imagining the anguish he would cause his mother.  
   
He had not been able to answer any of the letters.  It wasn’t that he didn’t want to; it was that when he picked up his pen it seemed to be physically impossible for him to actually make it move across the paper.  Setting the paper down on the desk, he leaned back in the chair and pinched the bridge of his nose.  “Shit.”  
  
A lieutenant stuck his head through the flap then.  “Major Paget?”  
  
“Yes?”  
  
“You’re wanted by the general, sir.”  
  
“Thank you, lieutenant.”  Picking the letter up, he caressed it lightly before dropping it into the box with the others and left the tent.  
  
*****  
  
Delaney was beginning to get the feel of Rifthold.  She shared the rooms above the bakery with several other young women, and though the days were long and hectic, they often went out afterwards.  There were always a dozen parties to be found, and it seemed like everyone in the whole city between the ages of fifteen and thirty managed to be at one of them.  At first she had hated it; the noise, the crush of bodies, and the smell of sweat and alcohol and worse all combined to make her feel nauseated.  But now she was used to it, and was coming to even enjoy it.  Gossip flowed with the liquor, and she found that as long as she had a drink in her hand and acted vaguely interested she was easily incorporated into conversation.  
  
Fulke had come to see her as soon as she had sent word of her safe arrival, greeting her with a hug and some clothes.  He agreed to take on Horse, so she wouldn’t have to worry about selling him.  He also insisted she renew her self-defense lessons, something she grumbled about but was secretly pleased to hear.  She had one day off per week, and spent that afternoon with him training.  He then had her and a rotating cast of friends for dinner.  About half the friends were rebels, from all over the empire.  The rest were people he met in the course of his cover job as an arms merchant.  Once Delaney convinced him to invite her merchant friends, and that was by far her favorite evening.  Rou and Fulke hit it off immediately, and the small flat was filled with all their laughter.  When her friends left the city a few days later, they assured her they would visit on their return; it was the only thing that kept her from grieving their departure.  
  
Otherwise the winter wore on uneventfully.  Her weekly letters to her dear Uncle Clery went out like clockwork, largely full of unimportant nonsense so far.  She caught occasional glimpses of young Prince Dorian when he rode out on his horse, always with a brown-haired youth of about Raedan’s age at his side.  Now that she was in Adarlan, she was able to keep better track of its soldiers, and had indeed confirmed that Raedan was still a soldier in General Paget’s camp.  Aedion’s promotion to captain made her grin, but she couldn’t brag as she wished to so she settled for cutting out the clipping with his name and tucking it in with her meager possessions.  
  
It was getting close to spring, though you wouldn’t know it in the city still filled with dingy slush.  She was bringing fresh rolls up to the front when she first saw her.  Rich, golden brown hair braided into a crown around her head; warm brown eyes flecked with gold; and such finely modeled features that she looked like one of the rare porcelain dolls she had seen in the shops.  The woman was probably a year or two older than Delaney herself, and she smiled so sweetly at Lina, who was working the counter that day, that Delaney froze.  When she turned to leave, her packet of cookies - cookies Delaney herself had baked - in her hand, she saw Delaney gaping at her and paused.  A tinge of shyness crept into the smile but she held her gaze for a long moment.  When she finally left, Delaney nearly fell over and she realized she had been holding her breath the whole time.  
  
“Does she come in often?” Delaney asked as she dumped the rolls into their basket.  
  
“Who?” Lina asked absent-mindedly, taking advantage of a short lull to neaten the glass case.  
  
“That woman with the cookies.”  
  
“Lady Massie?  Yes, she’s in regularly.  Loves our cookies and the miniature cakes.”  
  
Lady.  Of course she was an aristo, and Delaney herself was the unclaimed daughter of a soldier and a camp laundress.  Oh well.  At least she could look at her.  But to be able to see her regularly…it became of vital urgency that she learn the sales aspect of the bakery as soon as possible.  
  
*****  
  
It was the middle of the night when a runner started pounding on the door of Mikkal’s small cottage, still so new it smelled of paint.  He yanked open the door, and the wild-eyed boy panted out, “We’re under attack.  Rebels, hundreds of them.”  Cursing, Mikkal threw on his tunic and boots and his light armor, the runner helping fasten him in, then grabbed his sword and dagger, buckling them on as he moved.  Running out and up the closest watch tower, he met one of his fellow majors at the top, staring grimly down at the men with torches surrounding the camp.  A number of their own soldiers were marching through the gate, ready to engage.  As they watched, the rebels dipped their arrows in the flames and sent them soaring over the wall.    
  
“Well, shit,” Mikkal said as the arrows landed on the newly built buildings.  Most of them extinguished on impact, but a few started to burn.  Turning, he ran back down the stairs and towards the stables.  Chetak was already saddled along with the other officers’ horses, and he threw himself on and spurred him into a gallop.  They raced through the camp, the gates swinging open again as he approached.  The Adarlanian soldiers parted as he burst through, and he charged down on the rebels, using Chetak’s big body to drive them back without drawing his blade.  They began giving ground to get away from the plunging hooves, and his men surged behind him to aid in pushing back.  A few took aim at the horse with their bows and Mikkal roared in fury as they let fly.  Chetak grunted and lurched as an arrow hit him in the hindquarters.  Pulling him up, Mikkal reached back and yanked it out, sitting the resulting buck, then throwing his leg over and dropping to the ground.  The horse, not being a fool, spun and galloped back to the camp while Mikkal turned to the assailants.  They were poorly armed, with cheap leather armor, and his own troops were at his back as arrows began to fly from the watch towers.  One by one, the rebels began to drop, but they did not retreat; all who could stay on their feet engaged.  Mikkal found himself attacked by three opponents, whom he quickly disarmed, then disabled with strokes to the backs of their legs.  
  
“I don’t want to kill any of you,” he screamed in frustration, as the third man fell and a fourth came in to take their place.  There was no sign any of them heard.  The fourth man went down, and as he did so an impact drove into Mikkal’s left shoulder, bringing him down to his knees on ground that was already slick with blood.  Looking down, he saw an arrow protruding from the joint of his armor - an impressive, or lucky, shot.  He brought his sword up, then sliced down, shearing the shaft so it no longer protruded before lurching back onto this feet.  Looking down the hill, he saw his soldiers pushing the rebels back, continuing to pursue even as they turned to run.  Mikkal realized - this wasn’t going to be a mere victory for Adarlan, it was going to be a wholesale slaughter.    
  
He ran down into the fray, screaming at his men to stop, but his voice was drowned out by the cries of the dying rebels, by the bloodlust he knew was roaring through the veins of the soldiers.  As he reached the front and tried to turn back to get the attention of his men, a rebel leaped on him from behind and he went down, rolling, hooking the man’s ankles so when they stopped he was on top.  There was a thin burn from under where his armor ended but he couldn’t acknowledge it as the man slashed upwards with a dagger, just as he brought his own sword down.  His honed blade sliced through the man’s throat and sank deep into the spine beneath.  The threat eliminated, Mikkal sat back on the man’s abdomen and looked numbly at his throbbing sword hand.  The little finger was gone, the ring finger cut to the bone.    
  
A sudden cessation of noise made Mikkal look up.  The rout was over; the ground was littered with lumps he couldn’t bring himself to consider.  It was too dark to even begin to guess at the numbers, or to try to differentiate how many of those mounds on the grass were his own men.  Chest heaving, he looked down at the corpse between his knees.  The man’s dagger was laying in the grass next to him, and there was something next to it.  He reached down and picked the object up with his left hand, feeling a dull twinge of pain in his right and another just above his pelvis, and stared at it stupidly.  After several long seconds it registered that it was his finger.  Dropping it, he pressed his hand down on the chest of the rebel, studying it.  He could still hold a sword, still fight, still murder in the name of the King once his ring finger healed.  If only that knife had been sharper, had come up with more force…  
  
There was nobody near him.  He reached down and picked up the dagger.  Gripping it in his bloody left hand, he studied his right.  Angling the knife to fit into the existing wound, he sucked in a breath and yanked, drawing the blade through the ring finger and deeply into the middle one.  Biting down on his cry, he dropped his head for a moment and breathed, trying not to be sick from the sharp metallic smell of the blood that mixed with the smells of urine and shit leaking from the dead man beneath him.  Curling his index finger in, he finished the job on the middle finger, severing it at the first knuckle.     
  
He did vomit then, though the pain was more muted than he expected; it was more from the sight of the finger dropping, the quiet thud as it hit the ground.  He dropped the dagger next to it before vomiting again.  The spasms caused the burn in his lower abdomen to increase.  Once he was finally done retching, he stood shakily.  There was a sticky wetness seeping into his waistband and shirt and he looked down, but he couldn’t see past the edge of his armor.    
  
Voices sounded nearby, and he turned towards them and tried to walk up the hill.  The voices were familiar, but he couldn’t see anybody; suddenly he couldn’t see much at all, it was so dark, as if the moon and stars had disappeared behind clouds.  He took a few staggering steps before his legs wouldn’t work at all, and there was a distant shout as he went down on his knees.  
  
Suddenly there were hands on him, rolling him onto his back, and low fervent cursing.  His armor was unbuckled and he felt a pull in his left shoulder as the front was lifted off.  The arrow.  He tried to help but his arms, like his legs, wouldn’t move.  Somehow the moon and stars reappeared then, and there was enough light that he recognized one of his lieutenants and a couple of other men, one of whom had turned aside to retch.  One of the men was kneeling behind him, gently elevating his head, and he looked down, to see his abdomen gaping open, the torn muscle glistening through the blood.  
  
“Shit,” he tried to say, but nothing came out.  _Figures_ , he thought.  Now _the gods see fit to answer my prayers_.  His last thought before the world went black was, _Aedion, I’m sorry_.  
  
*****  
  
It was during a gray thaw that Aedion’s orders finally came.  As early as safe passage was possible, he was to select a small number of soldiers to head to Orynth.  There they were to try to glean what information they could about the Bane, most of which was rumored to be north of the Staghorns.  He was then to use his judgment whether to return to camp or continue north for more information, but he was to report back before taking any action to recruit members of the Terrasen army.  
  
This led to a series of arguments about how many soldiers should accompany him.  Aedion initially wanted to go alone, but accepted the general’s flat refusal.  Sayre wanted to send a small force of around thirty; Aedion insisted that would come across as overly aggressive for their purposes.  
  
In the end, they settled on five total: three regulars, one lieutenant, and Aedion himself.  Few enough to travel quickly, but not so few they would be vulnerable.  The first person he approached was Raedan; he hadn’t even gotten halfway through his first sentence before Raedan asked, “When do we leave?”  Aedion had blinked at him, and Raedan had given him a twisted smile.  “I’ll follow you anywhere, Aedion.”    
  
“It’s going to be rough.  Not too many inns on the way, we’ll be camping a lot, and I have no idea when we’ll be back.  Even if we’ll be back, when it comes down to it.”  
  
“Anywhere.”  And that was that.  
  
The rest of the soldiers were a bit harder to select.  Raedan took it upon himself to make suggestions, all of which Aedion ignored.  Not that he didn’t trust Raedan, but he knew what he needed.  He ended up selecting Osment and Dorsey, for the other regulars, and Lieutenant Hirons.  The latter was from the class of lieutenants that had preceded Aedion’s own, and he was good-humored and hard working.  Not the best fighter but clever and good in the woods, which would be much more important on this mission.  
  
Spring came early.  It was barely past the equinox when the rain replaced the snow and the flowers began to emerge.  Finally the general settled on a date, and it was a good several weeks earlier than originally planned.  Aedion was eager to get going; he had nothing to hold him now, especially since Raedan was coming with him.  The sooner he could get away from his cold sheets and empty bed the better.  Plus when he was hundreds of miles to the north he could pretend that was the reason his letters had all gone unanswered.  
  
Two days before he was due to leave, he found himself buried in Lizabet in the alley yet again.  He kind of figured fucking opportunities would be thin on the ground, given he had no interest in any of his companions.  When they had both finished and she was straightening herself, he blurted out, “I’m leaving in a few days.”  
  
“Oh?” she said, tucking her shirt farther into her skirt.  
  
“I don’t know when I’ll be back.  If I’ll be back.”  
  
She looked at him then, and gave the most casual of shrugs.  “Well, then,” was all she said, and she turned and went back into the tavern with no hint of a backwards glance, no trace of disappointment in her face.  He stared at the door for a moment, then started to laugh.  Still chuckling, he headed back to the camp.  
  
One of the stable boys took Avenar’s reins from him as soon as he dismounted.  “You’re wanted in General Paget’s study, sir,” he said, and Aedion thanked him.  He wondered what part of the plan had changed; he’d spent more time in that study in the past two weeks than he had in the previous ten months.  He walked to the main house and knocked on the door.  Mrs. Giffard let him in, and for once her pleasant face was grim as she led him to the study and knocked on the door.  He could smell fear and grief in the air, and a gnawing dread began in his stomach.  
  
The voice that called “Enter” was almost unrecognizable.  Aedion walked in, and the general’s gray, drawn face was decades older than it had been the day before.  He reeled back as if he’d been punched in the gut.  
  
“He’s dead, isn’t he,” he said, his own voice a mockery of its usual self.  “Mikkal, he’s…”  
  
“No,” the general said, shaking his head and coming around the desk to put a hand on Aedion’s arm.  “No, they think he’s going to live, at least as of three weeks ago.”  
  
Aedion dropped into the seat behind him and covered his face in his hands.  General Paget stood near him, patting his shoulder.  “What happened?”  He forgot to add the sir, and the general did not correct him.  
  
“Rebels attacked his camp in the middle of the night, setting fire to the buildings.  He rode out to try to drive them back, and he ended up in the midst of the fighting.  When they found him, he was next to the body of a rebel, and…” The general’s voice broke.  He took several deep, shuddering breaths and continued, “and he was missing most of his right hand, and was nearly gutted.  He also had the head of an arrow in his shoulder, they said he was hit early on and cut off the shaft so he could keep fighting.”  
  
Aedion was shaking his head, thinking of that body he knew so well, those hands, mutilated.  More scars marring his skin.  “But they think he’ll be all right?”  
  
“They think he’ll live,” General Paget repeated.    
  
Aedion caught the distinction.  “What aren’t you telling me?”  
  
There was a long pause before Paget replied.  “He never drew his dagger.  He rode out there without a shield, and he never even drew his dagger, just his sword.”    
  
It took a while before he understood.  His turquoise eyes were as hard as gemstones when he met the general’s.  “You don’t mean…you think he didn’t intend to survive.”  
  
“It was a rout, son, not a single rebel escaped.  According to the major who sent me the letter, by the time he was hit with the arrow, the fight was all but over.  And he ran back in.  He went to the front of the lines and engaged again.”  There were tears coursing down that rugged face, that Aedion had seen angry and calm and passionate but never so full of despair.  
  
_So you still pray for death, Mikkal, after all we had?  Were you thinking of me as you tried to die?  What kind of love is that, or was it never love for you at all?_   He dropped his head back in his hands, pressing his palms against his eyes until he saw a kaleidoscope of light as he fought back the tears, the anger that flared at the betrayal.  
  
Abruptly he stood, and bowed to the general.  “Thank you for telling me, sir.”  
  
“I don’t expect to hear more before you leave.  Do you want me to send updates?  It may be hard while you travel.”  
  
“Thank you, sir, but no.  I don’t think it’s practical.”  _And I’m not sure I want to know_.  He bowed and turned to leave.  
  
“He does…care for you a great deal, Aedion.”  General Paget had never used his name before that he could recall.  
  
His hand resting on the door handle, Aedion looked back at him.  “Not enough, sir.”  With another bow, he opened the door and left.


	14. Chapter 14

_Dearest Mikkal,_  
  
_I don’t know if you’ll ever read this.  I don’t even know if you’re still breathing as I write this, or if you let yourself be taken into the next world.  But I’m leaving tomorrow for Terrasen, and I know now that I will never see you again._  
  
_I shouldn’t put this on paper, but right now I don’t give a damn.  For the past day I have been so angry, and that helped me see through all the other bullshit.  I loved you.  I never told you that; I thought you didn’t want me to, but here it is.  I loved you, and you never really let me in._  
  
_I am grateful to you, for all that you taught me.  I don’t think I ever said that either.  You made me stronger in every way, and that is a debt I will never be able to pay.  But I will take it with me, and I will remember you, always._  
  
_Aedion_  
  
Aedion looked around his small room.  At the bed, stark and empty; the small bookcase, its denizens now packed away; the spot on the floor where he had collapsed in Mikkal’s arms, the last time he had ever done so.  At the desk, vacant save for the sealed letter with Mikkal’s name on it.  He hefted his pack over his shoulder and turned to leave.  The letter caught his eye one more time.  He pushed back through, crossed the room, and picked it up.  He studied it for a moment, then crossed to the small waste paper basket and dropped it in, and not a second later the door clicked shut behind him.  
  
A minute passed, and he was back in the room.  Grabbing the letter out of the basket, he opened the seal and wrote ten words at the bottom, then resealed it and left it on his desk.  
  
His men joined him in the stables while he was still readying Avenar.  The horses were laden down enough that it would add at least a day, probably two, to their trip, but there were few settlements between the camp and Orynth, and Aedion had no clue what condition any of the villages would be in.  That the roads would be ankle deep in mud was a given, and he had brought shoeing equipment for the horses as a precaution.  He was counting on being able to do at least some hunting, but bad weather could slow them even further.  There was also no way of foretelling what reception they would receive, given their uniforms; at least he had convinced Colonel Sayre to issue green and brown ones rather than the standard black and red, and the gold wyvern insignias were far less noticeable.  No reason to make themselves more of a target than they had to be.  
   
Spirits among the other four were high as they mounted and headed through the courtyard.  General Paget was standing there, a rare honor, and they all halted to bow while he wished them well.  Catching the look in his eye, Aedion sent his men on and stayed behind.  
  
“Are you certain that you don’t want me to send a messenger when I know more?”  
  
Aedion nodded.  “I’m certain, sir.  But thank you, for the offer.”  
  
Paget studied him for a long moment.  “I wish I was sending him with you today.”  
  
Swallowing hard, Aedion nodded.  “Me too, sir.  Me too.”  
  
Clapping him on the knee, the general gave him a nod.  “Go on then, and take care of your men.”  
  
“Thank you, sir.  I will.”  Wheeling Avenar, he jogged her up to Raedan, and they turned to trot through the gate together.    
  
“What’s going on?” Raedan asked, as quietly as he could over the sounds of the horses.  
  
“Mikkal…” He ground his teeth against the surge of anger.  “Mikkal was seriously injured in Fenharrow.”    
  
“Shit,” Raedan said under his breath, unaware Aedion could hear him.  “Will he be all right?”  
  
“I think it’s too soon to know.”  
  
Raedan turned his eyes back to the road, but didn’t say anything more.  The five of them continued north through town and onto the main road where they eased back to a walk.  So they continued through the day, walking and trotting, the fit horses not seeming overtaxed but Dorsey and Hirons looking a bit sore by the time they stopped to set camp.  They had passed several farms and small villages, but none with an inn.  This part of Adarlan was much less populous than farther south, and once they crossed into Terrasen it would get sparser still.  
  
The trip was remarkably uneventful save an afternoon and night spent with a farmer in the foothills of the Perranth Mountain gap when a late snow squall rose up, obscuring their vision enough that they had to seek shelter.  Aedion had been uncertain as to what their reception would be, but he would not soon forget the awe shining in the faded blue eyes of the farmer and his wife when he gave his name.  It broke his heart.    
  
When the farmers wouldn’t accept his money, he and his men had pitched in with the never-lessening mountain of work involved in farming.  The horses had looked a bit askance at having to share their accommodations with the cows.  Everyone else was more than content as they sprawled out on various guest beds and couches for the night, even Aedion’s hollow belly full with the delicious stew and bread.     
  
Since that night, his men had been a bit more subdued.  Dorsey in particular, who had been raised on a farm, had kept looking behind him as they left the hills and set out across the plains, the Staghorn mountains looming in the distance.   Aedion didn’t realize how much of the quietness stemmed from himself.  As they neared Orynth and began encountering villages with more frequency, they also encountered more people who recognized Aedion on sight, or who would stop and stare when one of his men said his name.    
  
It was Hirons who broached it one night as they were cooking the rabbits Aedion and Dorsey had shot.  “So you’re really a prince,” he said, breaking a silence Aedion hadn’t even noticed had grown around the crackling flames.  
  
“Yes,” Aedion said slowly, drawing out the word.  “I didn’t think it was a secret.”  
  
“No, I knew it, I guess I just didn’t really know it.”  Aedion’s brow furrowed, and Hirons went on.  “I mean, these people, the farmers, those villagers…they all love you.”  
  
Aedion carefully turned the stick the meat was speared upon.  “They loved my uncle and aunt.  They loved my cousin.  I’m just…a reminder, I guess.”  Hirons looked like he was going to go on, but out of the corner of his eye Aedion saw Raedan shake his head and the lieutenant subsided.  He didn’t even want to know what that was about.  
  
The sun was just beginning to drop in the sky the next day when Avenar crested a ridge and the white city was spread out in front of them.  Aedion’s breath caught and he blinked hard to keep the tears from escaping.  Raedan rode up on his left, Hirons on his right.  “This is where you grew up?” Hirons asked.  Aedion nodded, not trusting his voice.    
  
“Welcome home,” Raedan said softly, and Aedion closed his eyes and brushed his thumb and forefinger through his lashes.  He urged Avenar forward and, flanked by his men, headed towards the gates.  
  
*****  
  
It turned out Delaney was not only more than adept at selling bread, working the counter was an even better fount of gossip than the parties she went to most nights.  She soon learned that midday was the best time to be up front, as that was when the working people came in.  The guards’ shift change mid-afternoon was second best.  She blessed her memory every night as she sat up scribbling down notes that she would burn once her letter to her dear Uncle Clery was written.  
  
The beautiful Lady Massie did in fact come in twice a week to purchase cookies or miniature cakes or delicate flaky pastries, and time always slowed down for those precious few minutes where Delaney could gaze into those large, expressive eyes as they exchanged smiles.  A couple of weeks into her new position, the Lady thanked her shyly by name, and it was days before she stopped dreaming of the sound of her name in that musical voice.  
  
During one of her afternoon training sessions with Fulke, she paused for a water break as he worked her yet again on how to block an overhead knife strike.  “Do you know anything about Lady Massie?” she asked innocently.  
  
“Massie?  Massie?”  He thought for a moment.  “I don’t know a Lady Massie.  I know old Lord Massie, maybe she’s his wife?”  
  
There was no ring on those delicate hands that Delaney had studied as she’d handed over packets of pastry.  “Does he have a daughter?”  
  
Fulke shrugged.  “All I know about the old bastard is he’s one of the sycophantic pricks who keeps kissing the King’s ass every time he decides to invade somewhere new, since he’s made profiting from war an art form.  Hell, I think he’s funding half the invasion of Fenharrow at the moment.  Why do you ask?”  
  
“Just curious.  She comes into the bakery all the time and I was wondering who she was.”  Delaney thought her tone was utterly nonchalant, but Fulke eyed her suspiciously.   She squared up to him.  “Again,” she said, and he sighed as he repositioned her feet and ran through the exercise for yet another time.  
  
One morning a group of raucous soldiers came in to the bakery as Delaney was putting out fresh loaves.   She listened as she wrapped their orders more slowly than strictly necessary.    
  
“I heard it was an utter massacre,” one young man was exclaiming.  “A hundred and sixty rebels dead in under fifteen minutes.  I can’t wait to get down there, do more than train for once.”    
  
Delaney’s heart leaped into her throat, her hands shaking slightly as she finished taping the packet shut.  Clery and Kerrin and Flinn, all her friends in Orynth, Raedan, Aedion…  
  
“Do you really think we’re getting sent down to Fenharrow?” another asked, reaching for the package she handed him without looking at her.  Fenharrow.  She closed her eyes briefly in a silent prayer of thanks.  
  
“I’d bet a month’s pay on it,” said the first.  “After those bastards tried to burn down the camp and almost killed that major?  They’re going to send us all south.”  They pushed back through the door, still chattering, and the sudden silence when the door closed was a relief.  
  
South, not north.  But was it really any better that a hundred and sixty people were dead, just because she didn’t know them?  She felt a surge of guilt for thanking the gods that it was not her rebels who had been destroyed.  As if the people in Fenharrow mattered less.  Come to think of it, this must have been the attack noted a couple of weeks ago on the casualty lists.  But only the Adarlan losses had been noted: three regulars killed, one officer seriously wounded.  Not even a hint of the destruction that had been wrought.  
  
Another wave of people came in, and she tried her best to turn her focus onto her job, to smile and look pleasant as she took people’s money.  Yet Luk came to her an hour before her scheduled break and ordered her to go early.  “You look like you’ve seen a ghost, girl,” he said when she protested.  “You’re going to make my cakes bitter.  Get out of here, get some fresh air.”  
  
The spring sunshine was weak but optimistic when she pushed through the belled door.  It was chilly enough she was glad she’d grabbed her cloak, but the city had finally lost that dingy gray look it had borne for the past months.  She headed into the market square, dodging aristos and peasants alike as they all did their shopping.  Stopping at a cafe for a sandwich and a cup of coffee, she found a seat at a painted iron table right on the edge of the square.  The people bustling by held no interest for her today; still all she could think of was her friends falling under the sword.  Her sandwich lay in front of her, barely touched, as she rested her elbows on the table and pressed the heels of her hands into her eyes.  
  
“Are you all right?” came a tentative voice from over her shoulder.  Whipping around, she saw a tall girl who seemed to be all angles and remarkable blue-gray eyes looking at her with a concerned expression.  Two other girls stood a few paces back, studying her with superior airs.  
  
“Yes, I’m fine,” Delaney said, with a hideous attempt at a smile.    
  
“You hear that, Cherise?” called one of the other girls.  “She’s fine, let’s go.  I’m hungry.”  
  
Cherise glared at the girl over her shoulder before turning back to Delaney.  “Ignore them,” she said, loudly enough for them to hear, “they’re idiots.”  She gave Delaney a conspirator’s grin and Delaney couldn’t help but smile back.    
  
“I’m really fine, but thanks for asking.”  
  
The gray-eyed girl pulled out a chair and sat, uninvited.  “You look sad,” she said bluntly.  
  
Delaney struggled to come up with a reply.  “I just heard about the rebel attack in Fenharrow,” she finally settled on.     
  
One of the other girls, pale and sharp featured, snorted.  “You’re a bit behind the times, aren’t you?” she drawled.    
  
“Well, I understand,” the other one said dramatically, taking a few steps closer, “I was absolutely devastated when I learned it was Major Paget who was wounded.”  
  
Cherise rolled her eyes.  “Just because you danced with him one time…”  
  
“That’s one more time than either of you,” the dark-haired girl snapped.    
  
“Well, I heard he lost a foot,” the other girl said slyly, “so I think it was your last time as well.”  
  
“It wasn’t a foot, it was a hand.”  
  
“That’s even worse,” the pointy girl said.  “Can you imagine him touching you with his stump?”  She shuddered, and Delaney had to sit on her hands to keep from getting up and slapping her.  
  
“As long as he didn’t lose his most important part, I wouldn’t care.”  They erupted into giggles.  
  
“His head?” Delaney interjected drily, and they all three looked at her in a bit of shock before Cherise began to grin.  
  
“That’s not what I meant,” the dark-haired girl replied disdainfully.  
  
“Oh, so you’re saying you’d fuck him if he didn’t have a head?”  
  
Cherise burst out laughing.  The other two glared at her.  “You’re disgusting,” said the pointy girl.  
  
“Sorry,” Delaney said, not sounding sorry at all.  They stared at each other.  The other girl looked away first.  
  
“Come on, let’s get out of here,” she said to her companions.  The dark haired girl followed her, but Cherise stayed seated.    
  
“Rousalie’s always been a bit of a bitch,” she said.  “Just ignore her.”  
  
“I don’t really plan on ever talking to her again,” Delaney replied, picking up her sandwich again, “so it’s probably a moot point.”  She took a bite and chewed pointedly, waiting for the gray-eyed girl to leave.  
  
She didn’t.  “What’s your name?”  
  
“Delaney.”  
  
“Nice to meet you, Delaney.  I’m Cherise.”  
  
“Yes, I gathered that.”    
  
Rather than being offended, she looked coolly amused.  “Well, Delaney, I hope to run into you again soon.  I could use some new friends, you see.  Mine are shallow and stupid.”  She stood up and extended her hand.  Delaney looked at it for a moment before taking it.  “See you around.”  
  
She was halfway across the square before Delaney caught up to her.  “I’m sorry, I don’t know what’s wrong with me.”  
  
“Well, whatever it is,” Cherise said, her wide mouth turning up, “I hope it’s contagious.”  At Delaney’s obvious confusion, she laughed.  “This city could use more people like you.  Everyone else I know is boring.”    
  
Delaney looked down at the cobbles, the few little pieces of grass that were managing to poke out between them despite the thousands of feet that trampled over them every day.  “I’m not really that interesting,” she muttered.  
  
“Do you know Major Paget?” Cherise asked, tilting her head slightly.  
  
Delaney was thrown by the apparent non sequitur, and had to think for a moment before she recognized the name.  “The officer who was injured in Fenharrow?  No, never met him.  Why?”    
  
Cherise’s expression grew even more amused.  “Ugh, he stopped here last spring for a week on his way to another camp.  Everyone was half in love with him.”  She rolled her eyes, clearly excepting herself from the class of everyone.  “It was ridiculous.”  
  
“I take it he’s handsome?” Delaney asked, beginning to smile herself.  
  
“Handsome, and polite, and not interested in a damn one of them.”  She laughed.  
  
“Why did you think I knew him?”  
  
“I don’t know, you just seemed…more upset about how Brigitte and Rousalie were talking than most girls would be.”  
  
Delaney shrugged, keeping her tone as nonchalant as she could.  “My brother’s a soldier.”  She noted how Cherise’s face immediately changed, became serious.  “I’d hate to think of people talking about him like that if…”  The image of Raedan lying unconscious and bloody in the forest, the one that had haunted her for weeks, popped into her mind.  
  
“And that’s why you’re so sad.”  
  
She shook herself, coming back to the present.  “He’s not in Fenharrow, at least I’m pretty sure he’s not, but that doesn’t mean he’s safe.”  
  
Cherise took her hand and squeezed it impulsively.  “I’m sure he’s fine.”  
  
“Probably, at least for now,” Delaney agreed.  “But those three soldiers who died, and all those rebels.  What about their sisters?  Their families?”  
  
The tall girl looked as though she’d been struck.  Delaney freed herself and turned to leave.  “Please,” Cherise said quietly.  “Please be my friend.”  
  
“I’m around,” Delaney said over her shoulder.  “You can find me any time.”  Not that she would; no, Cherise’s clothes put her squarely in the “don’t associate with bakery employees” set.  She set into a jog across the square; her break was almost over.  So she never looked back to see the longing in those gray-blue eyes as they followed her through the crowd.  
  
*****  
  
The light filtering through the window was bright; it was well past dawn.  Mikkal couldn’t remember the last time he’d slept in this late.  He stretched and the arm around his chest tightened, pulling him in against that broad chest.  Lips grazed his neck, and he could feel his lover’s arousal pressing into his ass.  He let himself slump back, let his fingers intertwine with the ones splayed across his body.  Looking down past his own hardening cock, he could see those long fair legs tangled with his own and he sighed in contentment.  
  
Turning his head, he tried to roll over to meet those lips with his own.  At the movement, though, that big hard body began to break apart.  He shifted his legs, and the ones they were pressed against dissolved into so much sand.  The hand engulfing his own disappeared, taking his fingers with it.  Panicking, he thrashed around, desperate to see his lover, to hold onto him and never let go; but by the time he got himself flipped over Aedion was gone.  
  
Mikkal shot awake, reaching automatically across the bed to find only cool sheets.  Ignoring the burning in his lower abdomen he pushed himself into a sitting position.  The moonlight was shining through the window onto his pillow; he must have forgotten to close the drapes.  There was moisture on his cheeks, and he swiped at them furiously.    
  
He had to stop this.  He had to get out of here, but it had been over a month since the rebel attack and he still wasn’t strong enough to mount a horse.  When he woke up the day after, he had expected it to be his hand that hurt the most, but it was his damn abdomen.  Every time he turned, even just his head; every time he sat or stood or even used the gods-damned toilet the pain ripped through him.  The healers had stitched him together, had stopped the bleeding and saved his worthless life.  They kept telling him how fortunate he was that the knife hadn’t penetrated the membrane inside his body; if it had he would have died of infection.  They kept telling him if the arrow had hit an inch lower, it would have severed the main artery to his arm and he would have bled to death.  
  
It seemed he just couldn’t catch a break.  
  
He didn’t bother to bite back his grunt as he stood, awkwardly lighting his lamp with his left hand.  Sitting on the desk was the untouched letter that had arrived from his father earlier via express messenger.  It was rather fatter than normal, and he wasn’t sure he wanted to know what it contained.  What reproaches he could expect for putting himself in danger, as evidently Major Thrayer had seen fit to tell General Paget all he had observed from the watch tower.  At least he hadn’t been able to see what had really happened to his hand.  
  
The letter he was really waiting for still had not come.  With the support of General Chambers he had submitted a request for release from the army, citing his injuries.  Not that he had any notion of what he would do once released.  It wasn’t like he could be a farmer or a laborer; even with two functional hands he hadn’t a clue how to do that type of work.    
  
With a sigh, he picked up his father’s letter and ripped open the seal.   There was a second sealed letter inside.  He scanned his father’s first.  Not surprisingly, it contained the hope that when he did recover and was released from his obligation to the army, he would return home.  It was the second letter he had received from his father, the first having been written in response to Major Thayer’s and this evidently written not long after.  He had already dictated a letter reassuring his father that he was on the mend.  This time, he would write his own, though he knew it would barely be legible.  But first…  
  
He reached for the second letter, and his hand began to shake as he picked it up.  He had not heard from Aedion since a week before the attack.  On the back, beneath the seal, was written in his father’s hand, This was found in Ashryver’s room.  I don’t know if he intended to send it.  Mikkal had a brief moment of terror before he remembered Aedion would have left for the north by the time this had been sent.  Taking a breath, he opened it and scanned it, his heart fracturing more with each word.    
  
Aedion was right.  He hadn’t let him in, not completely, for if Aedion had seen him for the coward he was he would have scorned him and for good reason.  It had been yet another truth Mikkal had hidden from, had put off facing.  Too much of a coward to really embrace the fighting, too much of a coward to rebel against Adarlan even as he recognized the evil it was perpetrating; too much of a coward to even admit to Aedion how much he loved him.    
  
It was the postscript that kept him from falling into total despair.  That hastily written pair of sentences, added on at the end.  _Who am I trying to fool?  I love you yet_.  He couldn’t make any of this up to him, but…  He pulled a piece of paper to him, and picked up a pen in his left hand.  It still felt so foreign to him, like he was learning to play a new instrument.  Slowly, painstakingly, he began to write.  
  
It was dawn by the time he had finished his letters, enclosing Aedion’s in care of his father’s since the gods only knew where he was now.  Standing naked in front of the mirror, he studied the long puckered purple scar that slashed below his navel.  Looked at the bones now jutting through the skin, at the muscle that had gone soft, at the mangled hand that would, in fact, be his salvation.  Pulling on his clothes, Mikkal turned off his light and headed out to the courtyard, and for the first time since he had been woken up that horrible night he joined in the morning workout.  He was as slow and awkward as the most pathetic of new recruits, and every movement hurt, but he gritted his teeth and pushed on.  After breakfast he barely made it back to his bed before collapsing and falling into a sleep so deep he didn’t dream.  The afternoon was spent supervising training he couldn’t participate in, correcting footwork and grips over and over.  And so his new routine was born while he waited and waited for the letter from the King.  
  
*****  
  
Somehow, Aedion was not surprised when a knock came before he had even settled into his room in the inn.  A messenger stood outside holding a note; he dropped a copper in the waiting hand and took the sealed paper.  
  
_I would be delighted if you would join me for dinner.  Clery_.  There was an address below the signature, one Aedion didn’t immediately recognize.  He pulled out his map of the city.  
  
The years he had been away had struck Aedion like blows as he had ridden through the city.  On the surface Orynth was still beautiful, with the Staghorns rising behind the white castle on the hill, the broad winding streets, the parks that were just beginning to bloom with early flowers.  The colors, the noise, and the smells of cooking meat and fresh-baked bread and spices in the market had been nearly overwhelming to Raedan and Osment, who had never seen anything larger than the market town near camp.  Yet to him it felt as though it were dying.  Its lifeblood, its people - there were so few compared to the teeming streets he had been used to, and they moved so heavily, as if weighted down with loss and fear.  
  
He could not help but notice the way the people had stopped to gape at him when he first rode through the gates.  It was enough to make him pull his hood up, hiding his bright hair and his eyes.  He was grateful for the cloak masking the insignia on his uniform, though his heart ached with the knowledge he was riding through his home city wearing the garb of its enemy.  
  
An hour later, he threw his cloak back over his clothes, then went and knocked on the door of the room Raedan and Hirons were sharing.  The lieutenant answered the door.  
  
“I’m going to head out,” Aedion told him.  “You should eat and get some rest, I don’t know what to expect tomorrow.”  Hirons nodded, and Aedion went to Osment’s and Dorsey’s room with the same message before heading down the stairs.  Feet came racing after him, and he sighed as Raedan’s scent hit him.    
  
“I’m going out alone,” he said, without turning to look at his brother.  
  
“I know,” Raedan said, still following as they walked out into the street.  Half a block down, Aedion stopped and glared at him in exasperation.  “What?  I’m going out alone too, we just happen to be going in the same direction.”  His expression was innocent, though stubborn humor danced in his eyes.    
  
Aedion growled, debating whether or not to officially order Raedan back to the inn before he started walking again, following the route he’d memorized.  The address Clery had given him was in a fine neighborhood, but stood far from the glorious house he had owned near the palace when still a lord.  He paused at the gate, looking up at the tall, narrow townhouse, before pushing through with Raedan still at his heels.  The door opened before he could knock, a civil-looking housekeeper greeting him formally and showing the pair of them into a warm sitting room.  
  
“Lord Clery,” Aedion said bowing reflexively on beholding the older gentleman.  
  
“Not a lord anymore, Prince,” Clery said, bowing in return, not bothering to hide his displeasure as he beheld Raedan standing behind him.  “And who is your companion?”    
  
Aedion’s lips twitched as he replied, “Allow me to introduce Raedan Lamar.”  
  
Clery’s mouth dropped open briefly before he rushed to take Raedan’s hands in his own.  “You’re Delaney’s brother!”  he exclaimed, and it was Raedan’s turn to look shocked.  This was why Aedion had let him come along, and those gray-green eyes turned to him in a mute appeal for information.    
  
“I sent Delaney to Orynth, Raedan,” Aedion said quietly.  “That night, when…” He glanced at Clery.  “When everything happened.  She’s been here this whole time.”  
  
“Not quite,” Clery said, looking a little anxious.  “She’s in Rifthold now.”  
  
It took Aedion two breaths to understand, and he lunged for Clery, lifting him off his feet and pressing him against the wall.  “You’re using her as a spy?” he snarled in Clery’s face.  
  
The older man blanched.  “It was her idea,” he choked out, and a heartbeat later Aedion let him drop, though he didn’t take his furious turquoise eyes off of him.  Raedan pushed his way in between them, shoving at Aedion’s shoulder until he backed up a wary step, then two.  Clery straightened his clothes and met Aedion’s eyes calmly.  
  
“Come on, man,” Raedan said quietly, “let him explain.”  
  
So Clery did, about Delaney’s determination that had been redoubled after Raedan’s injury.  About all the measures he put in place to keep her safe, many unknown even to her; about her weekly letters and Fulke’s regular reports.  Aedion didn’t know Fulke, but that wasn’t surprising; no doubt most of Clery’s men would be strangers to him, especially now.  He had not known Clery as well as some of the other lords, like Darrow and Cal Lochan and the Allsbrook family.  But he had never doubted the man’s loyalty to Terrasen, nor his cunning as one of King Orlon’s preferred advisers.  
  
He rubbed his hands over his face once Clery had finished.  Until that moment, he hadn’t realized how much he had been looking forward to seeing her, to telling her about everything that had happened.  To hearing her own stories, and her thoughts on what to do moving forward.  She always saw things a little differently from him, a little more clearly.  Letting his hands dropped, he leaned back in the chair Clery had persuaded him to sit in.  Raedan was looking between the two men, pride and concern warring on his face.    
  
“I appreciate what precautions you’ve taken,” he said finally.  “I suppose I should have known she would find a way into the middle of the mess.”  
  
Raedan laughed, and Clery relaxed.    
  
“I’m sorry about that,” Aedion said, gesturing to the wall.  
  
“You forget, I knew Rhoe his whole life.”  He was looking at the wall with a faraway expression, seeing something other than honey-colored paneling.  “He would’ve left me with bruises, and not apologized for it afterwards when he was your age.”  He smiled fondly at the memory.  “Shall we go up to dinner?” he asked, and Aedion’s stomach growled loudly in response, earning another laugh from Raedan.  They headed up the narrow stairs and into the small dining room where the housekeeper was setting a fourth place.     
  
“My apologies,” Clery said, gesturing for them to sit.  “I had invited another guest, not realizing you’d be bringing one of your own.  He should be here shortly.”  His eyes flicked to Raedan, then back to Aedion.  Raedan did not miss the look.  
  
“If you want me to leave, I will,” he offered.  
  
The townhouse door opened before Clery could answer, and there came the sound of boots echoing over the hall tiles, then the stairs.  Aedion turned to the door, inhaling the unfamiliar scent of leather and resin that preceded the man.    
  
“Sorry, Clery,” came a voice like hooves on gravel, “I was-”  The man entered the room and froze, eyes locked on Aedion, a muscle twitching in his cheek.  Aedion held his gaze unblinkingly, assessing.  Though his features looked as though they’d been carved from granite, he was younger than Aedion had thought when he first appeared, perhaps only a few years older than himself.  No gray touched his thick brown hair, nor the stubble that lined his jaw.  But his hazelnut-colored eyes were as hard as his voice, and there was deep anger simmering there.  
  
Finally the man turned to glare at Clery.  “Is this a rutting joke?” he growled.  “You tell me…you send me that message, and this is what you mean?”  
  
“Cathal,” Clery said soothingly, “just sit down, let’s talk.”  
  
“You expect me to take this seriously?  A seventeen year old fallen prince in a gods-damned Adarlanian uniform?”    
  
Aedion could hear Raedan’s teeth grinding from across the table and he shot him a warning look.    
  
“And who the hell are you?” the man - Cathal - asked, looking at Raedan.  “Let me guess, you’re the soldier who’s been warming Ashryver’s bed.”  
  
Raedan laughed, though there was little humor in the sound.  Clery leaped to his feet and put a placating hand on Cathal’s arm.  “That’s Delaney’s brother, Raedan,” he said.  
  
Cathal snorted.  “You look pretty good for a corpse.”  
  
Aedion and Raedan both glanced at Clery. “He’s been north of the Staghorns all winter,” Clery said by way of explanation.  
  
Cathal shook his head.  “This is just a rutting waste of time.”  He turned to go but Aedion moved faster, on his feet and blocking the door before the other three men could blink.  Clery backed away a step involuntarily.  
  
“Why don’t you sit down, and we can listen to what Clery has to say,” Aedion said as pleasantly as he could manage.    
  
“How about you just go back to hiding in Adarlan, Prince,” Cathal snapped, bristling.  “The gods know you’ve been doing enough of that for the past three years while my people have been butchered.”    
  
“And what, exactly, was I supposed to do,” Aedion snarled.    
  
“That’s why I asked you both here,” Clery said to Cathal, “so we could learn what’s happened.”    
  
“You’re honestly going to trust any answer he gives?”  Cathal was shouting now.  “He didn’t just survive, he’s become a gods-damned officer.  And apparently he’s taken another officer as his lover, and you think there is one ounce of loyalty to Terrasen left in him?”  
  
Raedan eased to his feet and walked around the table, one hand resting casually on his dagger hilt.    
  
“Don’t worry,” Clery said in an undertone, “Cathal won’t hurt him.”  
  
“That’s not who I’m worried about,” Raedan replied, just as quietly.  There was a flicker of something that might have been fear in Cathal’s eyes as the words registered.  Aedion smiled grimly.  
  
“Are you really such a stubborn prick you can’t even sit down and listen?” he asked.  Anger was warring with reason in Cathal’s face, and Aedion pressed him further.  “Or is it that you have such a brilliant plan to protect Terrasen that you don’t need me?”  
  
Turquoise eyes stared into brown ones for a long moment.  “You have one hour,” Cathal finally said, before going to sit in the vacant seat at the foot of the table.  A servant appeared promptly with soup, and Aedion fell on his as if he were starving.  
  
Clery and Cathal were gaping at him, and Raedan looked to be struggling not to laugh when Aedion surfaced for air a few minutes later.    
  
“When did you last eat?” Clery asked in some concern.  
  
“Around midday,” Raedan answered for him, before taking an exaggeratedly polite spoonful of the soup.  
  
Clery muffled his surprise, and Cathal turned to Aedion and said drily, “Well, princeling, I’m amazed you survived such hardship as not eating for an afternoon.”  
  
“It is impressive, I know,” Aedion replied, mimicking his tone.  A little flash of surprised humor lit Cathal’s face for a brief moment before the stony expression returned.  
  
The next course was brought in, and Clery turned to Aedion.  “Why don’t you tell us what’s happened, and what you want from us.”  
  
With a deep breath, Aedion began.  Even Raedan hadn’t heard all of it.  He had never known about the scar on Aedion’s palm that he showed them all, hadn’t realized that he began planning to send Delaney to Terrasen from the moment she confessed her desire to leave the camp months before the need arose.   He glossed over the details of the night Delaney had finally fled, though he couldn’t stop the roughening of his voice or keep his eyes from briefly meeting Raedan’s.  Nor could Raedan stop the trembling of his hands when Aedion told of the attack in Oakwald.  
   
“Do you understand now, why I couldn’t just leave?” he asked Cathal when he had finished.  “My choices were die, or feign cooperation.  I wasn’t going to help anyone but myself if I died.”  
  
Cathal looked flatly skeptical.  “Your story is certainly compelling,” he said.  “But I still find it hard to believe Adarlan would be so stupid as to send you back here without some way of leashing you.”  
  
“It has baffled me, too,” Clery said.  
  
Aedion huffed a laugh.  “Me too, if I’m being honest,” he said.  Raedan set his fork down and passed the remains of his plate across the table for Aedion to polish off.  
  
Cathal studied Raedan for a moment, fingers tracing the rim of his wine glass.  “I expect they’re using your lover to ensure your cooperation.”  
  
Raedan stared back, a dangerous spark deep in his eyes.  “You seem to have a fascination with who Aedion takes to bed,” he said.  “You keep bringing it up.”  
  
“Are you trying to imply that it’s not you?”  
  
Aedion and Raedan looked at each other and both laughed.  “Hardly,” Raedan said.  “I have no interest in men.”  
  
“And even if you did, it would be too much like incest,” Aedion added, and Raedan nodded.  
  
“But,” Cathal turned to Aedion, “do you deny that you have an Adarlanian lover?”  
  
“I’ve fucked a lot of people,” Aedion said lazily.  “I’m not sure why it’s relevant.”  
  
“Because according to reports, at least one of them wears that gods-damned uniform,” Cathal growled, “and I have concerns about how you can remain loyal to Terrasen while sharing your bed with an officer who no doubt would happily see my country burn.”  
  
“I wouldn’t go there,” Raedan said warily.    
  
“Or what?  Is he going to attack me because I dare to question the integrity of a soldier he welcomed into his bed?”  
  
“It’s a valid question,” Clery said mildly.  
  
Aedion watched the flickering candles on the table, debating protesting the existence of any such relationship.  Yet somehow he couldn’t bring himself to deny Mikkal.  “I understand your concerns,” he said, too quietly, “but I can assure you they are unfounded.  He…did not support the invasions.”      
  
It was Clery who pushed this time.  “Do you deny that Adarlan could well use him to force your cooperation?”  
  
“Not likely,” Aedion said grimly.  “Or if that was their plan, they certainly didn’t go about it properly.”  
  
“What do you mean?” Clery asked.  
  
Aedion couldn’t keep the bitterness from his voice.  “They sent him to Fenharrow six months ago.  He was gravely wounded over a month ago, I got word just before I left.  For all I know, he’s already dead.”  His laugh made all three men flinch.  “If they hoped to use him as some sort of a leash, don’t you think they should have kept him safer?”  
  
A silence followed.  “No,” Aedion said at last.  “I’ve decided this is a test.  They figure that either you’ll kill me and save them the trouble, or I’ll declare myself a citizen of Terrasen, side with you publicly, and they can hang me in the market square in a grand celebration, and spike my corpse on the palace gates.  Of if by some miracle I actually follow orders, they can use me as a means to keep Adarlan’s foot on Terrasen’s neck.”  Raedan leaned back in his chair, watching him, tapping his knee absent-mindedly with his fingers.  “I don’t think it has occurred to them that I might play a more subtle game.”  One side of his mouth quirked up.  “One of the advantages of being seen as merely a cocky brute.”  
  
Cathal held his eye for a long moment, then turned to Raedan.  “Well, if you’re not his lover, what is your role in all of this?  You have no reason to care about the fate of Terrasen.”  
  
“Have you ever had a friend who was so close they were your brother in all but blood?  Where you’ve seen each other at your absolute worst moments, and it makes no difference?” Raedan asked quietly.    
  
“Yes,” Cathal said, face so tight with pain Aedion reached halfway across the table to him before his brain caught up.  He slowly withdrew his hand, settling it in his lap.  
  
“Then you understand.  My allegiance is to Aedion alone.”  He looked across the table, a small smile on his lips as he took in Aedion’s expression.  “Don’t look so shocked, you fool,” he said, and Aedion laughed.  A grin flashed across Cathal’s face, disappearing so quickly it seemed as if the expression was afraid of being caught.  Aedion couldn’t help but notice how it much it changed him, though.  How much younger it made him look.  
  
Clery called for port, and once it was poured he settled back in his chair, glass in hand.  “Now that we’ve cleared the air, perhaps you can tell us what your plans are.”  
  
“I don’t think so,” Aedion replied slowly.  
  
“Excuse me?” Cathal said flatly.  “Why the hell am I here then?”  
  
“You’re acting like I invited you,” Aedion snorted.  “I’ve been in Orynth all of,” he checked the clock on the mantel, “four hours.  I don’t know you, I barely know Clery, I expected to see Delaney here and for all I know she’s buried under a floorboard somewhere instead of in Rifthold.”  Clery and Raedan both choked, and Aedion felt a twinge of guilt until a glance at Raedan revealed him smothering a laugh.    
  
“I could turn you in,” Cathal bristled.  “I could go to the garrison commander right now and tell him you’ve been meeting with rebels.”  
  
“Cathal,” Clery warned.  
  
“You could,” Aedion said, “if you want to get Clery killed, go right ahead.  It seems counter-productive to me.”  
  
“I don’t have to tell him which rebels.”  
  
“Ah, but see, he knows I’m here.”  
  
Three faces wore identical expressions of horrified shock.  He tilted his chair onto its back feet, long legs stretched out in front of him.  “I was under orders to report to him when we arrived.  Since I had barely set my stuff down in my room when the note arrived, I brought it along.  I had a hunch that Clery was smart enough to meet with officers on a regular basis, keeping up appearances.”  He tilted his head at Clery, who nodded stiffly in response.  “I’m not exactly inconspicuous.  If I’m going to a private home the same night I arrive, it could look suspicious.  So I told him I’d gotten an invitation to dine with you, and asked him if it was some sort of a mistake.”  He shrugged.  “He assured me that you had extended the same courtesy to him, and recommended I take you up on it as you serve excellent food.  He was quite right, by the way.”  Cathal opened and closed his mouth once or twice, but nothing came out.    
  
“But what would you have done if you were wrong?”  Clery asked, pinching the bridge of his nose as if he had a headache.  
  
“I would have declined the invitation as having been in error,” he said with a shrug.  “You were clever enough not to put my name on it.”      
  
Clery was looking from Cathal to Raedan as if expecting them to help in some way, but they seemed just as dumbstruck.  He tossed his hands in the air and let them fall in his lap.  “Delaney always did say you were smart.”  
  
“And you didn’t believe her?” Aedion tsked.  “You should have known better.”  
  
“Well, now I do.”  
  
Cathal stood.  “I think I’ve had all I can take for tonight.  Thank you for the meal,” with a bow to Clery before turning to Aedion.  “Ashryver.  You’ll forgive me for not bowing while you’re wearing that uniform.”  
  
Aedion rose and held out his hand, which Cathal took hesitantly.  “I’ll be in touch through Clery,” he said, and Cathal nodded and left, looking like he’d been through a whirlwind.  
  
Before Aedion and Raedan took their leave, Clery brought them into his study and began rifling through a large stack of papers.  Pulling out a few sheets, he looked up at the two young men opposite him.  “What’s his name?” he asked, and Aedion looked at him stupidly for a moment.  
  
Raedan, reading the sheets upside down, caught on faster.  “Paget,” he said.  “Major Mikkal Paget.”  
  
Clery scanned down one sheet, then another.  On the third, he paused.  “This reports that he suffered partial amputation of one hand and an abdominal wound.”  He looked up and Aedion nodded.  “Well, he’s not on the two most recent casualty reports,” he said gently.  “If he had died from his injuries, he would have been listed.”    
  
Aedion looked at his feet, blinking rapidly against the sting in his eyes, and Raedan bumped his arm with his shoulder.  “He’s all right,” Raedan said, his voice thick. “He’s all right.”  
  
Out in the entrance hall, Clery put his hand on Aedion’s arm, pulling him to a stop.  “Give Cathal a chance,” he said.  “He lost everything in the takeover, and the battles afterwards.”  
  
Aedion met his eyes, taking in the lines around them that had deepened so much in the years since he’d seen Clery last.  “So did I,” he said.  “Remind him of that.”  With a slight bow, he turned and followed his brother out into the street.  The lamps had come on, and he realized he had forgotten how the lights turned the white buildings they illuminated to a buttery gold.  The noises of people talking, of doors closing, of children laughing, followed them as they walked towards the inn in silence.  Through a window thrown open to catch the chill spring air they could hear music spilling.  It was a simple song on a piano, picked out by fumbling fingers, but Aedion couldn’t help but stop and listen.  He looked over his shoulder at the palace that loomed over the city with the mountain rising behind it, then at Raedan, who had stopped a few paces away.  
  
“Welcome to Orynth,” he said, and they continued on, shoulder to shoulder, up the street.  
  



	15. Chapter 15

Aedion strode through the streets of Orynth, seething.  Ten days, he’d been here.  Ten days, and not a gods-damned thing had been accomplished.  For some reason, he had expected the rebels to be organized, or at least vaguely on the same page, but their infighting was going to destroy them.    
  
He had made some headway with Darrow, whom he thought had been pleased to see him when Aedion had appeared at his door unannounced the morning after his arrival in Orynth.  Darrow had never had the warm, open manner of King Orlon, but at least when the King had been alive he had been pleasant and reasonably kind, if reserved.  In the months after the assassinations, he had been trying so desperately to keep the country from falling that his hidden strength and passion had been forced to the forefront.  But now, he was a shadow of his former self - cold, withdrawn, looking only to survive.  Continuing on only out of love for a memory.  
  
Aedion had thought he was making some headway with him.  They had met several times at Darrow’s house, Aedion slowly laying out more and more of his plan.  It all hinged on him gaining control over what remained of Terrasen’s army; it would be far easier to keep Adarlan in her own borders if he followed orders and rallied the Bane. Yet this was what Darrow had argued against most strenuously.  
  
“They’re scattered all over the country, boy,” he had said dismissively in their last meeting two days prior.  “It will take months, and some of them will never agree to serve someone in that uniform, no matter who they’re related to.”  
  
“I understand that,” Aedion had said patiently, “but the King knows that a large portion of them survived.  They will be hunted down and slaughtered -”  
  
“They already have been,” Darrow had snapped.  “And the rest will see you coming for them as another attempt on their lives!  They will kill you, boy, before you can even explain yourself.”  Fear.  There was fear in those cold eyes, not for the members of the Bane but for Aedion himself.    
  
“I told you last week, sir, that I’m either coming out of Terrasen at the head of the Bane, or I’m not making it out alive.  I meant that.  The King will kill me if your men don’t.  With your support, sir, I’m certain they will at least listen to me.  At that point it’s up to them.”  He had shrugged, resigned to his fate at the hands of strangers.  “If I can’t convince them, I don’t deserve to lead them.”  
  
That was when Darrow had agreed to introduce him to the surviving members of the Bane who were still living in Orynth, which had led to the meeting he had just left.  Bastards.  Rutting cowards.  They had looked at him, listened to him, seemed to believe him - and then told him pityingly that he was a fool.  
  
“You’re only going to bring Adarlan down on us again,” auburn-haired Captain Seoras had said condescendingly.  “We’re just starting to rebuild.  Give it time, we’ll survive.”  
  
“And is that why I just walked past three fresh bodies hanging?” Aedion had snarled in response.  “They’re still butchering our citizens, still sending them to Endovier to die for petty crimes.  If we can gain control-”  
  
“But you can’t, Prince,” interrupted Major Ualam.  “You can’t get control of Adarlan’s forces, even if you somehow manage to rally ours.  We can’t have you sacrificing more Terrasen lives for a fool’s hope.”  
  
A fool’s hope.  Those words were echoing in his brain as he prowled.  Aedion heard the unmistakable sound of a knife being drawn and turned down a seedy-looking alley where a couple of men were arguing.  They took one look at his hooded figure, sheathed their knives, and melted into the shadows.  Damn.  He could’ve used a good fight.  Sparring with the men charged with the so-called protection of the city wasn’t taking the edge off in the slightest.  It was taking all of his self-control not to gut the bastards, especially once he realized how active the butchering blocks still were.    
  
At least Clery was behind him.  He had met with him twice more, alone, and had finally discussed possible strategies.  It was Clery who had suggested he have someone go with him who would be trusted enough to give the scattered warriors pause.  Raedan, Dorsey, Osment, and Hirons would have to remain here.  There was too much risk in taking them, even though he was certain they would not betray him.  Raedan wasn’t going to like it.  And Aedion had no idea who he could convince to go with him.  Obviously Ualam and Seoras and the other men from tonight were out, and he was pretty certain Cathal would scoff as well.  After all, he hadn’t even bothered to show up for this meeting, though Darrow had invited all the remaining officers in Orynth.  That there were so few left in the city that they could fit in Darrow’s parlor was something Aedion didn’t even want to think about.  
  
He needed to get out of his head.  He hadn’t slept for more than a couple of hours for the past four nights, getting up and roaming the silent streets when he couldn’t remain still in his bed.  The more he moved, the more restless he got.  Likely he wouldn’t sleep at all tonight, at the rate he was going.  Abruptly he turned and headed back to the inn.  Maybe if he drank enough.  Or maybe, if that kitchen maid was still looking at him the way she had last night…  
  
Raedan and Dorsey were sitting in the inn’s tavern, each with an arm around a woman.  It looked like Raedan was actually with the same one he’d had the night before, a first as far as Aedion knew.  He nodded at them and went to the bar, settling into the seat closest to the taps.    
  
An hour and who knew how much ale later, the kitchen maid whose name might have been Dolidh was leading him towards the stairs.  He vaguely hoped they were going to his room so he wouldn’t have to move too far afterwards, though at least for now the floor was still steady.  Dorsey had disappeared, and Raedan was deeply involved with the woman who was now seated quite happily on his lap.  He caught a vaguely familiar scent as they went past the door, but Dolidh ran a hand up his arm and he forgot everything but his need for release as they headed upstairs.  
  
*****  
  
Cathal looked up as a hand tapped on the bar to see Clery seating himself, looking irritated.  The former lord had gotten him this job once he had finally been able to get out of bed after Terrasen had fallen.  He had toyed many times with joining some of his fellows north of the Staghorns, but he still felt that he owed Clery, so he had stayed.  Even though there were parts of the city he still couldn’t bear to walk through, he had stayed.    
  
“What?” he asked, concerned, as he poured the brandy Clery ordered on the rare occasions he appeared here.    
  
“Why in Hellas’ name were you not at that meeting?”  
  
“What meeting?” Cathal asked, baffled.    
  
“Darrow’s.  With Ashryver.  You told me you were willing to listen to his plan, but you can’t even bother to go to the damn meeting?”  
  
“Clery, I don’t know what the hell you’re even talking about.  Darrow had a meeting?”  
  
Now Clery was looking more concerned than annoyed.  “You didn’t know about it?”  Cathal shook his head, still feeling out of his depth.  “Then why…” Clery stopped abruptly, grinding his teeth.  “Those bastards.”  
  
Cathal looked down the bar.  It was empty aside from Baltair at the end, who was so deep in his cups a horse could’ve come in, sat next to him, and ordered a whisky and the old man would’ve just nodded hello to it and kept humming to himself.  Still, he kept his voice low.  “Will you tell me what is going on?”  
  
Clery sighed, taking another sip of his brandy.  “You know Ashryver’s been meeting with Darrow.”  Cathal nodded.  “Well, he finally got through to him, enough that Darrow sent an invitation to all the remaining officers in Orynth.”  
  
“All nine of us?” Cathal said drily.  
  
“Evidently only eight of you.  The others met with him a couple of hours ago, and Seoras and Ualam did what Seoras and Ualam do.”  
  
“Shit.”  Those cowardly pricks, too busy profiting off the invasion have any interest in actually taking the country back.  It pissed him off that they were still treated as officers, that Ualam actually outranked him.  
  
“Right.  Of course the others didn’t dare push back once Ualam laid it down that Ashryver was a fool for even trying to rally the Bane.”  
  
Cathal blew a breath out threw his nose.  “No doubt that’s why Darrow didn’t invite me.”  
  
Clery tapped his glass thoughtfully.  “I think he did intend to, actually, but he was relying on the others to spread the word.”  
  
“So Seoras or Ualam didn’t want me there.”  Clery nodded.  Cathal glanced at Baltair, then looked back at Clery.  “Where’s Ashryver now?”  
  
“Who knows?  Maybe back at the Whispering Antlers?  That’s where they’ve been staying.”  
  
Cathal grinned.  “Well, isn’t that convenient for us?”  Clery gave a bit of a smile.    
  
Twenty minutes later he had kicked Baltair out and was heading through the city, cursing Seoras and Ualam soundly under his breath.  It wasn’t that he didn’t understand whatever reservations they had had; any attempt to push Adarlan out of Terrasen seemed fraught with risk.  Most likely he’d just get them all killed.  Didn’t mean Cathal didn’t want to judge for himself.  Especially as he remembered Clery’s words to him from a few days earlier:  “Aedion lost everything, too, Cathal.  Don’t forget that.  He’s in the same position you and I are.”  Much as he didn’t want to admit it, he knew it was true.  
  
He entered the inn’s tavern just as a huge man with bright hair was disappearing through an interior door.  Weaving through the mostly-full tables, he headed after him when he heard his name called out.   Turning, he saw Ashryver’s young friend, Raedan, sitting at a table with a familiar pretty girl in his lap.  He picked his way over to him, studiously not looking at Kenna, who was playing with Raedan’s hair.  One of Clery’s employees, though he doubted the soldier knew it.  
  
“Ashryver up in his room?” Cathal asked without preamble.  
  
“Yeah, but I’d leave him be for a bit,” Raedan said.    
  
“I need to talk to him.”  
  
“Just…trust me.  He’s in a foul mood, let him work some of that off.”  Kenna laughed, and Raedan kissed her shoulder before turning back to Cathal.  “Have a drink or something, he’ll probably be back down in a bit.”  
  
Cathal turned and sat at the bar, barely touching the ale that appeared without him ordering it, glancing at the door to the stairs.  After what seemed like an eternity with no sign of the prince, he asked the bartender - another of Clery’s - what room Ashryver was staying in.  Ignoring Raedan, who was still watching him from that damn table, he headed up to the third floor.  
  
Finding the room he pounded his fist once on the door then, not waiting for an invitation, tried the handle, which to his surprise gave immediately.  Half falling into the room, he pulled up abruptly at the sight of Ashryver’s pale ass moving as he thrust into some girl, the only visible parts of her being the fair legs and arms wrapped around him.  Judging by the sounds she was making, he was interrupting at a particularly inopportune moment, though he doubted she noticed as her moans turned into guttural cries.  Ashryver did, those bizarre eyes flicking to him before turning back to the girl underneath him, never even faltering in his movements.  Cathal backed out of the room, closing the door quietly behind him, then turning to lean back against the wall, listening to the girl climax.  
  
Come to think of it, he should’ve picked up on the noise before he ever opened the door.  Gods-damned Ashryver.  Stupid prick, not even locking the door.  He banged his head once against the wall, then headed back downstairs.  Raedan and Kenna met him on the landing.    
  
“I told you,” Raedan said, his eyes dancing.  
  
“You said he was in a bad mood,” Cathal snarled.  “You didn’t tell me he was fucking somebody.”  
  
Kenna tried to stifle her laugh as Raedan led her past Cathal, but her hazel eyes were sympathetic when they met his.  He was surprised she was going to bed with Raedan.  That was decidedly not one of her jobs for Clery, who didn’t believe in whoring.  She must actually like the boy.  Damn them all to hell.  He was stuck relying on teenage boys still ruled by their cocks to save his country.  Terrasen was doomed.  
  
His ale was where he had left it, and he sniffed it briefly before downing half of it in one gulp.  He drained it in two more swallows, and the bartender passed him another.  He wondered how much he would have to drink to get that image, those sounds, out of his head.    
  
It had been two years, six months, and twenty four days since he had been with somebody.  Two years, six months, and twenty three days since Luthais had fallen during the first hour of that final battle.  In that time Cathal had remained faithful to both the lovers he lost to Adarlan, had not even touched someone with tenderness.   
  
Somehow the sight of Ashryver mounting that girl brought everything he had buried for so long to the surface.  Muire’s screams as she was dragged to the butchering blocks echoed again in his ears.  He had never forgiven the handful of his men who knocked him unconscious to keep him from getting himself killed trying to rescue her.  Then not six months later he had dashed among the corpses on that battlefield, turning over body after body until he found Luthais, throat gaping open like a second mouth.  He didn’t remember much for weeks after that, still didn’t know how he’d made it off that battlefield and back to Orynth.  
  
He had at least seen Muire buried.  He still didn’t know where Luthais had been lain.  If his body had been burned by the invaders, or if he was in some mass grave with all the others who had fallen that day.  
  
The glass before him was empty without him realizing he had even taken a sip.  Ever since that night at Clery’s Luthais had been intruding on his thoughts again.  He’d managed to go months without thinking of either of them, as long as he stayed in the safe parts of the city.  Then Raedan had asked him that damn question.  Shit.  It all came back to Ashryver, that two-faced rutting bastard.   
  
There was the scrape of a stool, and the bastard himself settled next to him.  Ashryver’s face was still flushed, and he smelled like sex and sweat and stale ale.  “What brings you here?” he rumbled, sounding exhausted.    
  
Cathal examined him more closely, noting the dark, almost bruised look under his eyes.  “You look like shit.”  
  
“Seems like you went quite a bit out of your way just to tell me something I already know.”  He rubbed a broad hand through his hair and yawned widely.  
  
“Go up and get some sleep.  We can talk tomorrow.”  Cathal didn’t know why he was feeling so charitable.  
  
“Can’t sleep, might as well talk now.”    
  
Cathal looked around him.  The tavern had largely emptied out, and he recognized almost everybody who was left.  “What happened at the meeting?”  
  
“Your cohorts made it clear that they think my assignment is doomed.  Like I didn’t know the odds were against me as it was.”  He gave a bleak laugh.  “Not a damn one of you is willing to help me, are you.  I just need an in.  That’s it.  Just someone the other soldiers will recognize so they’ll give me a chance.  But you’d all rather sit here and piss on my corpse.”  
  
“Don’t lump me in with those pricks,” Cathal snapped.  The next four words fell out of his mouth, and then he couldn’t take them back.  “I’ll go with you.”  
  
Ashryver looked at him, eyebrows up almost to his hairline.  “You?  You couldn’t even be bothered to come to the meeting, but you’ll travel all over the country with me?”  He signaled to the bartender.  “You wanted to walk out when you met me just last week.  Why the change of heart?”  
  
It was a good question, and he didn’t want to say that it was Raedan’s unflinching dedication that had swayed him.  “Maybe I just want to watch you fail with my own two eyes.”  
  
Ashryver’s lips twitched as he glanced at him sideways.  “Maybe that’s not all you want to watch.”  
  
Cathal felt the heat rise in his face.  “Not my fault you’re too rutting stupid to lock your door.”  
  
Ashrvyer laughed.  Picking up the glass that had just arrived, he held it up.  “To rutting stupidity and almost certain failure.”  
  
With a wry shrug, Cathal clinked his glass against the proffered one, the noise surprisingly loud in the mostly empty room.  “Nothing like an optimistic start to all this.”  
  
*****  
  
The bell on the bakery door jangled and Delaney looked up from where she was restocking the cookies, alone in the store front for the first time all day.  The previous half hour had been a whirlwind of customers and the case was nearly empty.  It was the tall, gray-eyed girl from a couple of weeks ago.  Cherise.  Her face lit up when she saw Delaney.  
  
“So this is where you work!” Cherise exclaimed, a broad smile spreading.  “I haven’t been in here in ages, do you still have those puffy things filled with chocolate?”  
  
“Not today, but we do make something like that.”    
  
“Let me guess, you bake too, right?”  Delaney nodded.  “I figured.  You’re probably great.  You seem like one of those people who’s just good at everything.”  
  
Delaney snorted.  “You decided this after talking to me for five minutes?”  
  
“I decided it the moment you asked Brigitte if she’d fuck somebody without a head.”  Naise had chosen that unfortunate moment to walk in with a load of rolls and she stopped abruptly, looking from Cherise to Delaney with a horrified expression.    
  
“It’s not what it sound like,” Delaney said, hurrying over to take the rolls from her.    
  
“I don’t even know what it sounds like,” Naise said, “but if Luk catches you using that type of language in here -”  
  
“She didn’t,” Cherise said, “I did.  I swear, she has been nothing but the image of civility.”  Naise escaped into the back, looking over her shoulder warningly as she went, and Cherise burst into laughter as soon as the door swung closed behind her.  
  
“You’re going to get me into trouble,” Delaney hissed, but any heat she meant to put into it dissolved as she fought an unholy desire to join in laughing.    
  
“Now that I’ve found you,” Cherise said, as if the preceding thirty seconds hadn’t happened, “we’ll need to become very good friends.”  Delaney made a noncommittal noise as the door swung open and two soldiers entered.  Cherise departed empty-handed, ignoring the male eyes that followed her, and Delaney turned back to her work.  
  
Every day after that Cherise came into the bakery, usually after the midday rush.  If they had the chocolate-filled pastries she would buy one and nibble at it while talking with Delaney until other customers arrived.  Delaney still didn’t really know what to make of her, but as the days rolled into weeks she found herself looking forward to her visits almost as much as Lady Massie’s.  
  
The latter appeared one afternoon, and she and Cherise greeted each other warmly.  Delaney sighed internally, fighting down the surge of envy that her new acquaintance was friends with the Lady.  Delaney handed over her packet of cookies, holding those beautiful brown eyes with her usual shy smile.  She didn’t notice the flicker of hurt that passed over Cherise’s face as she watched them looking at each other.    
  
“I could introduce you two,” Cherise said after Lady Massie had left.  Delaney felt her cheeks flush and she glanced at her friend, ready to dismiss the notion.  But that vibrant mobile face was without its usual light, the gray eyes downcast, mouth tight.  Before she could say anything, a cluster of women came in, and Cherise slipped out in the bustle.    
  
Days passed, and Cherise didn’t come back.  Delaney found herself looking up eagerly every time the bell jangled.  And even when Lady Massie’s beautiful voice greeted her by name, she found herself longing for the laughter of her friend instead.  
  
*****  
    
Mikkal looked at Chetak’s stirrup.  It looked impossibly far off the ground.  He glanced at the man at Chetak’s head, then sighed, placed his hand on Chetak’s mane and lifted his left foot.  About halfway to its destination, his leg froze as pain ricocheted through his body.  He set his foot back down and rested his forehead against the saddle, muttering a long string of curses against the leather.    
  
It was imperative that he figure out how to get on a gods-damned horse, or he would never be able to leave.  
  
“I can give you a leg up, sir,” said the patient man who had been holding the horse for the past several attempts.  Mikkal shook his head, then dropped the stirrup a few inches, studied it, then dropped it a few inches more.  When he left, there wouldn’t be anybody to help him.  Once the stirrup was low enough, he hooked his right wrist under his left knee, and was able with only a moderate level of discomfort to raise his foot to the lowered stirrup.  Pressing his toe down firmly, he reached up, pinched the back of the saddle with his right thumb and finger and bounced twice on his right foot, gritting his teeth against the spasm of pain in his gut.  Pushing off, he dragged himself up so his body rested across the saddle, breathing as deeply as he could before swinging his right leg over, biting down on his growl as the motion pulled on his muscles.  His boot brushed the horse’s rump and Chetak started, but the man held him fast.  Finally, finally, he was on.  
  
It took another minute to fix his stirrup, and then he set off at a walk.  Chetak ambled around the camp, steady as an old plow horse.  The muscles in his lower back and hips, which he hadn’t even realized were tight, began to loosen up with the motion of the horse, and he started to relax.  After a lifetime spent on horseback, he realized how much he had taken it for granted.  How much he really loved being up so high, on a creature who was his partner and his friend.  
  
Loved it, that is, until it was time to get off.  Then the ground looked impossibly far.  Leaning forward over Chetak’s glossy neck, he slid his foot carefully around behind him, then dropped down.  The jolt as he hit the ground shot through him and his legs gave out.  He let himself fall, knowing the landing would hurt less than trying to stop it.    
  
“Are you all right, sir?”  Three stablehands had rushed over to him when his ass hit the ground, but he was grinning despite the burning in his eyes.  
  
This was it.  In another week or two, once he got his dismissal, he and Chetak would be on the road again, and this time he would be leaving the battlefield behind him for good.  
  
*****  
  
Weeks passed while Aedion waited for the passes through the Staghorns to clear enough to traverse.  The last thing they needed was to get stuck in the middle of nowhere in snow, which could easily drift up over even Avenar’s head.  In the meantime, he memorized maps and sparred with the small Adarlanian company that was holding the city and schemed when he could with Clery and Darrow.    
  
One evening Cathal appeared in the tavern at the Whispering Antlers while Aedion was eating with his men.  He looked a bit askance at Dorsey, Osment, and Hirons, but dropped into a chair at Aedion’s gesture.  “The runner got through,” he said.  “We should leave as soon as possible.”  
  
The men exchanged glances.  They knew that Cathal was going as Aedion’s guide, though only Raedan was aware of his true status as an officer of the Bane.  None of them were happy about being left behind.  Hirons had argued the most strenuously, not trusting Cathal’s motives, but had given in when Aedion had tasked him with keeping the garrison under control in his absence, which was expected to last months.     
  
Aedion nodded.  “I can be ready in the morning.”  Raedan started to say something, but subsided.  Aedion asked, “What time do you want to leave?”  
  
“If we leave within an hour after sunrise, we should make it to a good camping spot before nightfall.”  His eyes were roving around the room, leg bouncing up and down, fingers tapping on the table.  
  
“Sounds good.”  Aedion cleaned his plate, watching Cathal twitch.  “Do you want something to eat?”  
  
“No.”  
  
Dorsey and Hirons silently passed Aedion their plates, and he finished what they didn’t want.  Aedion tilted his head at his men, and all but Raedan left.  “What’s bothering you?”  
  
“Nothing.”  Aedion just waited.  Several minutes passed, then Cathal stood abruptly.  “I’ll see you in the morning.”  He strode out of the tavern.  
  
Aedion and Raedan exchanged looks.  “Do you trust him?”  Raedan asked.    
  
“No,” Aedion replied, “but Clery does.”  
  
Raedan’s sniff indicated what he thought of that.  “And you really won’t let me come with you.”  
  
Aedion shook his head.  “No.  It’s bad enough having one man in Adarlanian uniform riding down on these people, having more will invite catastrophe.  Even if you go disguised, you can’t hide your accent.”  Raedan slumped in his seat, arms crossed.  “Besides,” Aedion added slyly, “if you came with me you’d be away from Kenna for who knows how long.”  
  
Raedan’s neck turned red.  “I’d still rather come.”  
  
“I know.”  The truth was, he felt a bit as if he was diving blind into dark waters when he thought of leaving Raedan behind.  “But I need you here.  Keep working with Clery, he still hasn’t moved to get the rebels to stand down in the city.  We need to get the garrison thinking that they’ve succeeded.”  
  
“You’ve told me this a thousand times,” Raedan said with some asperity.     
  
The weight of the task before him pressed on Aedion’s shoulders.  Despite all the planning he’d been doing not just for a few weeks but for the past year, everything hung on the whims of other people.  He honestly couldn’t even be sure Cathal wouldn’t just slit his throat in his sleep once they were up in the Staghorns, though the soldier seemed too straightforward for that to be likely.    
  
“Shit,” he said under his breath, letting his head fall back so he was looking at the intricately paneled ceiling.  It was so odd, he thought, studying the perfect symmetry of the inlaid honey-colored squares overhead.  Someone, a hundred years ago when building this inn, decided to put so much time adding beauty into something few people would likely ever see.    
  
Sitting up straight again, he looked around the crowded tavern.  It was packed with people who managed to be together yet separate; eyeing each other with interest, or longing, or even despair.  So many scents and emotions crashed down on him, he had to get out.  “See you in the morning, brother,” he said to Raedan.     
  
“‘Night,” Raedan replied, his face lighting up as Kenna began making her way over to him, dodging preoccupied bodies, her own face glowing as her eyes met his.  Aedion’s lips twitched up even as an ache began in his chest, and he turned and escaped into the open air.  
  
It was just beginning to rain, a drizzle so fine it looks like the drops were hanging in the air rather than falling.  Flipping his hood back, he tilted his face up to it.  His hair and skin dampened, though he couldn’t feel the water hitting him.  He started walking, not going anywhere in particular, just letting his feet carry him where they would.     
  
The castle appeared in front of him, stark against its backdrop of craggy mountain, the white walls seeming to glow faintly despite the dark and the increasing rain.  He stopped on the corner, unable to walk closer to the gates he could see were twisted and bent, even from where he stood.    
  
Aedion had avoided coming here all these weeks, though it was only a few blocks from the inn he had selected for its very proximity.  It was visible through much of the city, but from afar it felt more impersonal, like a distant god looking over him.  But tonight…he couldn’t leave, not without seeing it one last time.  When he had been sprung from the tower three years ago, they had fled the city with such haste that he had not thought of anything other than his freedom.  It had never occurred to him that the castle would haunt his dreams.  
  
Blinking the rain from his eyes, it was almost as if he could still see them all.  Rhoe and Evalin, dancing across the lawn to music only they could hear, Aelin clapping her hands and laughing as she watched.  Orlon, smiling benevolently, tugging gently one one of Aelin’s curls while Darrow stood quiet and stoic at his side.  Quinn and Cal and Kenway and Hen, all sparring with him and each other in the training fields that lay behind the castle.  Ren, the only boy who would stand up to him, yelling at him in the stables; tiny Elide, following Aelin around, ducking behind statues and through doorways if Aelin happened to glance her way.  These silent white walls filled with sound and color, all those snuffed-out lives vibrant again for a few brief moments.  
  
He felt a touch on his elbow and whirled, startled, but there was no one there.  Shivering a little at his own overactive imagination, he looked back over his shoulder at the castle, ghostly in the fading rain, before starting back to the inn to snatch what sleep he could before the dawn.  
  
*****  
  
Cathal was a bit surprised to find Ashryver already tacked up and waiting for him when he arrived, the sun not quite rising.  His men were standing with him, all eyeing Cathal warily.  One of them, a few years older than the others, he might’ve even said looked threatening.  He had almost forgotten what it was like, to have a family of soldiers.  Ashryver didn’t even know how lucky he was.  
  
Or maybe he did.  One by one, he pulled each of his men into a hug, saying things Cathal couldn’t hear as he did so.  He looked so much older than his years in that moment.  His men stood back as he mounted his big brown mare.  “You have your orders,” the Captain-Prince said, and they bowed as one.    
  
The city was still asleep, the only sounds as the two of them rode through the gates the horses’ hooves on the road.  Soon even that was muffled, as they left the road to head around the city’s walls and up into the mountains behind.  The spring sun warmed their backs as they climbed.  Cathal was surprised when Ashryver paused before a steeper section and swung off his mare, to lead her instead.  He did the same.  All four of them were sucking air by the time they reached the top and remounted to ride along the ridge before the path began to rise again.  
  
So they continued through the morning.  Once, long before the sun had reached its peak, Ashryver pulled up abruptly, swung his small bow off his shoulder and strung it, and had an arrow nocked and ready before Cathal even heard the flock of geese.  The arrow flew, then a second and a third, each finding a mark before the first bird had even fallen.  Dismounting, he dropped his reins and disappeared into the scrub pine, appearing several minutes later bearing three carcasses that he quickly tied to the back of his saddle.  Before he remounted, he pulled some dried meat out of his pack and held it up.  
  
“Want some?” he asked, the first words either of them had spoken all day.  
  
Cathal shook his head, furrowing his brow.  “It’s not even midday.”  
  
Ashryver bit off a piece and started chewing as he hopped back onto his horse.  “I know,” he said, once he had swallowed.  And that was the extent of their conversation for the day.  
  
They didn’t stop again until the sun had nearly dropped behind the trees and they reached a small level clearing, just big enough for the horses, themselves, and a fire.  Ashryver tended the horses quickly and efficiently while Cathal gathered some wood.  Using his hatchet, he split the damp logs, then shaved one of the split logs into large splinters.  While Cathal got the fire started, Ashryver sat down on a rock and began plucking the geese.  
  
Once the birds were roasting on a makeshift spit just in front of the fire and Cathal was lounging on his bedroll, Ashryver finally spoke.  “Tell me about who we’re going to meet first.”  
  
Cathal looked into the flames, watching them flare briefly as fat from the geese dripped off and splattered.  “The last I knew, Dewar and Grant were living pretty close to each other, another couple days’ ride north and east.  Don’t know if any of their men are with them, or who they’ve kept in touch with.”  He glanced over at the prince, who had moved to turn the birds.  “Clery suggested we go there first.”  
  
“You didn’t agree?”  
  
Cathal chewed his lip for a moment before answering.  “They’ll likely give us a chance to talk at least.”  
  
“But…”  Ashryver looked at him expectantly, waving his hand to encourage him to continue.  
  
Suddenly all Cathal could think of was Dewar’s thick arm around his chest, holding him while he screamed for Muire.  He’d never even seen the blow to his temple coming.  He only knew that Luthais had fought to get to him while they struck him because he’d been told so once he’d come around.  They had ended up knocking Luthais out cold as well.  He had never again spoken to the men involved, not after he had awoken and seen the scornful pity in their eyes.  
  
He didn’t answer, and Ashryver didn’t press him, just went back to tending the geese.  Traveling with the prince was rather like traveling alone, only apparently with better food.  Eventually he dozed off, lulled by the heat and the crackling flames.  
  
Movement woke him a while later.  Ashrver was sliding the cooked geese off the spit and onto a bed of clean leaves.  He sat up abruptly, rubbing a hand over his face.  “Sorry.”  
  
Ashryver glanced at him, amused, then began hacking apart the birds.  He handed Cathal a leg and took one for himself, sitting back on his rock and tearing into it.  Cathal bit into his own, his appetite flaring as the juice from the meat flooded his mouth.  “You can cook,” he said in surprise.  
  
The prince laughed.  “I can sit meat over a fire and not burn it, is all,” he said, cutting himself another large hunk.  Cathal followed suit; unlike Ashryver, who had kept pulling food out of his saddlebags as they rode, he hadn’t eaten since breakfast.  Once they were finally satiated, Ashryver carefully wrapped the rest of the birds in leaves and tucked them into an oilcloth bag, then hung the bag from a tree.  
  
“How’d you learn to cook?” Cathal asked, watching him.    
  
“One of my uncle’s men taught me.”  His closed expression was utterly foreign to that naturally open face, and Cathal realized how little he really knew about Ashryver.  He knew about the prince - the rumors and reputation he had built both before the takeover and what filtered up from Adarlan afterwards.  Gifted, arrogant, vicious; all of Orynth had been whispering when he’d broken an older boy’s jaw when still a child, and in recent months the whispers had swirled again that he had killed at least two men in Adarlan.  But Cathal had known Rhoe, if only slightly, and would have expected little else from his protege.  Those whispers told nothing about the man himself.  
  
After checking the horses, Ashryver found the softest patch of ground he could and shook out his bedroll.  “What, no tent, Prince?” Cathal quipped, and Ashryver’s grin was visible even in the firelight.  
  
“I thought you were packing the tent and some beds, and a few ladies besides.”  
  
“So sorry to disappoint your highness.  Think you can manage to go a few months without sticking your cock in something?”  
  
An answering laugh rumbled through the clearing.  “I suppose we’ll find out if celibacy proves fatal.”  
  
“Never has yet.”    
  
The next day went much the same, though the long stretches of silence were punctuated by a bit more conversation.  Cathal found himself explaining that he had once known Dewar well, that the former major had been his commanding officer prior to the invasion.  Grant had been his fellow captain, fighting next to him under Major Ward in the final battles.   
  
He didn’t tell him about Muire or Luthais, not then.  Even though, after how Ashryver had talked about his own lover’s possible fate in Adarlan, he was certain the prince wouldn’t judge him.   
  
That night it rained, and they tucked themselves under the densest possible stand of trees, the horses picketed just outside of it.  A low whicker from one of the horses awoke Cathal hours later.  The rain had ceased, and he could hear the horses pawing.  He wondered if there was a ghost leopard about.  They were a bit farther east than the big cats usually ranged, but it was breeding season so anything was possible.  Still, the horses didn’t sound that fearful, just agitated.  
  
A strangled noise came from his left, followed by intense rustling, and he bolted upright, unable to see much with the clouds and tree branches obscuring the sky.  He freed himself from his bedroll and began crawling towards the noise, patting the ground with his hands until he finally hit wool, then a thrashing body.  His eyes had adapted enough that he could see Ashryver’s big form, twisting violently, blacker than the surrounding dark, but couldn’t find anything or anyone attacking him.  A nightmare?   “Ashryver,” he said, then repeated it, louder, as he shoved at whatever part of him he had encountered.  “Prince!”  There came no reply other than a ragged, sobbing breath.  “Aedion!” he finally shouted, punching out blindly, hoping he wasn’t hitting the poor man in the balls but desperate to wake him up.  
  
The next thing he knew, he was flat on his back, arms pinned on either side of his head, Ashryver snarling viciously in his face.  In that moment, there was nothing human about the prince; indeed, as the moon peeked through the clouds Cathal would’ve even sworn his canines looked longer, though when he blinked again the illusion was gone.  The pressure on his wrists was hard enough the bones groaned.  His legs were trapped painfully under the larger man’s knees; he couldn’t move.  Wouldn’t have dared to, even if he could; some instinct told him any attempt to free himself would get him nothing but a broken neck.  
  
“Aedion,” he breathed, and Ashryver blinked.  “Aedion, it’s all right.  You’re all right.  It was a dream.”  A second later he was free, and Ashryver was retching next to him.  He sat up slowly.  
  
“Shit, Aedion…”  There was no answer other than hoarse breathing.  “Does that happen often?”  
  
“Not too often anymore,” Ashryver said, gagging one last time before wiping his mouth.  “You shouldn’t have woken me up, I could have killed you.”  
  
“If you think I’m going to let anyone suffer like that, even in your sleep, think again,” Cathal snapped.  
  
A low, mirthless laugh was the only response.  
  
Cathal didn’t even want to consider the possibilities of what Ashryver might have been reliving.  There were certainly things that could happen to a man during the normal course of battle to make him react like that even years later, and he had been so young during the invasion.  That night at Clery’s, Ashryver had told about having his fingers broken, about being dropped in a prison pit, about being tied down and beaten, but…even as he had spoken, Cathal had suspected they weren’t hearing the worst of it.  
  
He crawled the rest of the way out from under the trees and stood.  The horses were quiet now, the air cool and damp.  For some reason he found himself crying.  It was so strange; he had never been able to shed a tear for Luthias.  Two years, seven months, and sixteen days without a single tear.  There was movement behind him as Ashryver got to his feet, and he swiped furtively at his cheeks.  
  
“I’m sorry,” came the deep, rolling voice.  “Did I hurt you?”  He knew he would have bruises, but that wasn’t what was troubling him; he shook his head, not trusting his voice.  A broad hand landed on his shoulder and he startled; he hadn’t even heard footsteps in the leaves.  “Sorry,” Ashryver said again, letting his hand drop.  
  
Cathal glanced over his shoulder, catching the prince’s concerned look in the dim light.  “I’m fine,” he said, hoping Ashryver wouldn’t notice the thickness in his voice but knowing that he would.  He cleared his throat.  “We’re going to do this,” he said fervently.  
  
“Do what?”  
  
“This.  We’re going to raise the Bane, and turn it against that murdering bastard, and take down everyone who stands against us.”  He turned to face Ashryver fully.  The prince dropped his head, looking at the ground for a long moment before meeting his eyes.    
  
“I won’t fail you,” Ashryver vowed, holding out the hand with the scar he’d given himself.  
  
Cathal shook it, squeezing, smiling a little at the answering pressure.   
  
*****  
  
Mikkal sat on Chetak, looking not at the road curving to the east but across the rolling grassy hills to the north.  The gods knew his heart called him there.    
  
The paper in his saddlebag ordered him east, to Rifthold.  When the letter had finally come, he had not been released from his service as expected.  No, the accursed paper had contained a commendation for his bravery, and an order to return to Rifthold to discuss his prospects.  Even General Chambers had been surprised.    
  
He could disappear.  There was no one around, no one to see.  If he wasn’t in the city at the prescribed day, five days hence, who would care?   But Adarlan did not take kindly to deserters, they were pursued aggressively regardless of their status.  A deserter who was an officer, and a general’s son no less, would be a prize for any bounty hunter.  And if he led them to Aedion, to whatever he was planning in the north…He couldn’t risk it, couldn’t risk him.  
  
Sighing through the pain as his heart fractured again, he reined Chetak east.  
  



	16. Chapter 16

  
Aedion and Cathal crested a ridge and halted, a bucolic valley spreading out before them.  To the east lay a small lake fed by the stream they had been following since the previous day.  To the west was a cluster of buildings, one rather larger than the rest.  Cattle, sheep, and horses dotted the verdant floor.  Aedion glanced at his guide.  Cathal had been quiet the whole trip, but since they awoke this morning he hadn’t said two words.  Now, he looked down on the picturesque scene with the stricken eyes of someone who had been dealt a mortal blow.  Aedion turned back to the valley, something about it seeming familiar.  
  
“I think I’ve been here before.”  Though his voice was low, it seemed to shatter the brittle silence.  
  
Cathal looked at him, expression inscrutable.  “You have been.  You were here for about a week three years ago.”  
  
Huh.  After his escape from Orynth he had followed Darrow’s men and Quinn all through the Staghorns to small camps like this one, staying a few days at each before moving on, until they had managed to meet up with Darrow himself in the eastern foothills.  All of that was just a blur to him now, but he wondered how many of these places he had been to, how many of these men he had met.  
  
“And you were here.” Not a question.  Cathal nodded. “Damn.”  
  
Cathal nudged his gelding forward, and Aedion and Avenar followed.  The horses picked their way carefully down the rocky slope.  “What about being here bothers you?” Aedion asked when they were about halfway down.  
  
“I’m not bothered,” Cathal snapped, and Aedion just raised a brow and waited.  “Oh, go to hell,” Cathal added when he saw Aedion’s expression.  
  
“No doubt I will, sooner or later, but in the meantime I want to know if I’m walking into a trap.”  
  
Cathal shook his head.  “No.  At least, not that I know of.  I wouldn’t lead you deliberately into a bad situation.  I meant what I said, the other night.”  
  
They hadn’t spoken again of Aedion’s nightmare, and he had not asked Cathal why he had wept afterwards.  What nightmares of his own that had brought to the surface.  Certainly every warrior had enough reason to wake screaming now and then.  
  
Once on the valley floor, they picked up a canter, the horses happy to really move out for the first time in days.  The buildings were farther away than they had appeared from up on the ridge, and Aedion was ravenous by the time they reached the largest building.  It was a well-built log structure, weathering well, with an attached stable at one side.  Cathal pulled up well back from the porch and sat on his horse for a moment, chewing his lip, before glancing at Aedion and dismounting.  
  
Aedion joined him, and Cathal handed his reins over.  “Wait here, let me talk to him first,” he said in an undertone, just as the door creaked open.  A broad-framed, thickly muscled man emerged, hair and beard lightly silvered, expression changing from wariness to recognition as Cathal pushed his hood back and approached.  
  
“Cathal Rosach!” he said in a tone of pleased surprise, hurrying down the two steps from the porch.  “I never thought I’d see you again.  To what do I owe the honor?”  
  
Cathal looked at him for a long moment, and Aedion thought they were going to embrace; certainly the stranger looked ready to do so.  Then Cathal pulled his arm back and punched the man in the face as hard as he could.  The man fell to the ground.  
  
Aedion dropped the reins and ran, cursing, getting one arm around Cathal’s body, the other around his shoulders, and lifting him sheer off the ground before he could do more damage.  He carried him back to the horses, both of whom had happily dropped their heads to crop the new spring grass, and held him there.   
  
“What in Hellas’ name do you think you’re doing, you gods-damned fool!” he hissed in Cathal’s ear.  “Are you trying to ruin us before we even start?”  
  
“I…I didn’t mean to do that,” Cathal said, voice shaking.  “I don’t know what happened, I just…I saw him and…”  
  
“Shit.”  Aedion set Cathal back on his feet but didn’t let go of him.  Glancing over his shoulder, he saw the stranger rising on one knee, hand pressed to his cheek.  The man spit on the ground, the saliva bloody.  “Everybody’s worried about my temper, and they send me out here with a gods-damned lunatic.”  Cathal made a noise that might’ve been agreement, might’ve just been a sign that Aedion’s grip around his ribs was too tight.  He loosened his arms.  
  
“Stay here, or I promise I won’t just put you on the ground, I’ll put you in it,” Aedion snarled, quietly enough the man he guessed was Major Dewar couldn’t hear him.  Cathal didn’t flinch, just nodded, eyes trained on the ground.  
  
Aedion strode back to where Dewar was still kneeling.  He kept his hands out in front of him as he approached and said, “Sir, are you all right?”  
  
“Fine, fine,” the man said, working his jaw.  “Probably should’ve seen that coming.”  Aedion offered him his hand, hauling him to his feet when he took it.  Once he was standing, he spat again before probing his mouth with his finger.  “I know I deserved it,” he said, looking up at Aedion with a rueful half-smile, “but damn, I forgot how hard that fucker hits.”    
  
Aedion huffed a laugh.  “I’m not sure what you could’ve done to have deserved that.”  
  
Dewar’s demeanor immediately changed.  He stepped back and looked Aedion up and down.  “And who are you, then?”   
  
Realizing his mistake, Aedion tugged off his hood.  “Aedion Ashryver, sir.”    
  
“Well, Prince,” Dewar said coldly, “I don’t suppose you care to tell me what you’re doing here.”  
  
A few men emerged from the surrounding buildings, and Aedion suspected they’d been watching the whole time.  He wondered briefly if they were going to attack, but Cathal, who had been monitoring all of this with increasing concern, stepped forward.  “He- er, we’re here on behalf of Lord Darrow and Clery.”  Murmuring rippled around them, but the tension in the men eased slightly.  “We’d like to talk to you, Major.  I promise not to hit you again.”  The ghost of a smile flitted across his face.  
  
Dewar looked from Cathal to Aedion then back again.  “Gibson!” he called, and one of the younger men stepped forward.  “Put up these horses.”  The young man nodded, and moved to grab the animals.  “You two, follow me.”  He turned, and with a quick exchange of glances Aedion and Cathal followed him into the house.  
  
They ended up in a cozy sitting room.  One of Dewar’s men joined them, and the major asked him to bring a tray.  Aedion’s stomach grumbled audibly in response.    
  
“Does one of you want to tell me what the hell you’re doing here?” Dewar growled.  
  
With a warning glance at Aedion, Cathal replied, his gravelly voice steady, “We’re going to raise the Bane.”  
  
Dewar barked a laugh.  “Is that all?” he asked, with fake mildness.    
  
“No,” Aedion said, before Cathal could answer, “but it’s the beginning.”  
  
“So the traitor-prince has even grander plans, then.”  
  
Cathal bristled, and Aedion leashed his own temper tightly.  He had been planning his speech for the whole ride here, and he couldn’t let his irritation ruin it.  “I’m not a traitor,” he said quietly, unbuttoning his cloak to reveal the wyvern insignia, the captain’s stripes.  “At least, not to Terrasen.  I was captured, yes; I did not surrender, and I took no oath.  I have risen within the Adarlanian army, and I plan to rise farther.  But not for Adarlan.  
  
“Do you know what they do to men like me in those camps?”  He shook his head.  “I imagine not.  You forget, I think, that I know the ways of both countries.  What they do there…” He clamped down on his shudder.  “It does not inspire loyalty.  The King does not know the difference between loyalty and fear.  And when he sent his men to break me, he didn’t realize who he was dealing with.  I will not be overcome by fear - but they think they succeeded.  
  
“The King is spreading his forces too thin.  He sent me here for this purpose.”  Dewar looked startled, and Aedion nodded.  “It’s true.  My assignment is to rally the remnants of the Terrasen army under the Adarlan flag.  He never even considered that I might comply with his orders and use it against him.  He’s that confident.”  He snorted.   
  
“I don’t know if Adarlan can be beaten, or if Terrasen can be freed.  Likely not without outside aid, to be honest; not when we don’t have Orlon or Rhoe, or even Aelin, on the throne.  But if we don’t get their soldiers out of here, get the gallows to stop swinging, there won’t be anything left to save.”  
  
Dewar cleared his throat.  “And you think you can do this.”  
  
Aedion nodded slowly.  “Yes.  And so do Darrow and Clery, if that’s any comfort.  They know my plans.  They think it’ll work, at least to remove the immediate threat, provide some stability.”  
  
“And what, pray tell, do you plan to do with our army once you control it?”  
  
The grin Aedion gave was wolfish.  “Agree to help, and you’ll find out.”  
  
“You can’t seriously expect me to turn over the control of my men, men I’ve been working with for longer than you’ve been alive, without more information.”  
  
“And you can’t seriously expect me to tell you everything I’m planning when it could all easily get me killed.”  
  
The two men stared at each other for a long moment, Cathal sitting back and looking from one to the other.  Dewar finally said, “You must be starving.  Why don’t you go see where Tulach is with the tray he was supposed to fetch.”  
  
“I’m fine,” Aedion said, “I’ll wait.”  
  
Dewar’s lips twitched.  “Let me rephrase that.  I’d like to talk to my friend about you behind your back.  Please allow me the chance to do so.”  
  
Aedion felt like an idiot as he stood with a glance at Cathal, who gave a tiny nod, face carefully expressionless.  He hesitated a moment, then left swiftly, with a slight incline of his head to Dewar.  He debated staying in the hallway to listen, then he remembered Cathal’s utter determination when he announced they were raising the Bane.  With a brief prayer to whichever god watched over such things as trusting strangers, he followed his nose to the kitchen.  
  
*****  
  
Dewars settled back in his seat and surveyed Cathal over steepled fingers.  “I really am glad to see you,” he finally said.    
  
Cathal made a noncommittal noise in response.  The roaring in his ears was distracting him, and he swallowed hard, dampening it slightly.  Few things had ever felt more satisfying than his knuckles connecting with his former commanding officer’s face, and he half wanted to do it again.  But he couldn’t let Ashryver down that way.  Or Clery.  
  
“How did you end up getting roped into this?”  
  
“I volunteered.”  
  
Shaking his head, Dewars rose and walked over to a small side table, pouring two glasses of amber liquid and handing one to Cathal before returning to his seat.  “You have to know it’s a fool’s errand.”  
  
“Why is that?”  
  
“The men are never going to rally behind Ashryver, whatever you and I say about it.”  He waved a casual hand in the air.  “No matter what, he will always be doing this in the name of the King of Adarlan and wearing his uniform.  Nobody will give a shit what he professes.”     
  
Cathal cocked his head.  “Don’t underestimate him,” he said.  “He inspires loyalty.  You should see his men, they revere him.”  
  
“And you?” Dewar asked with a knowing smile.  “You certainly didn’t waste any time, did you.  You’ve known him what, a month?”  
  
It took Cathal a second to grasp the insinuation.  “Go to hell,” he said, hating that he could feel the blood rising in his face.  
  
This was going nowhere fast, and Dewar was trying to provoke him, that was obvious.  Cathal rubbed his hands over his face, pressing his fingers briefly against his eyelids.  “Look,” he said, “what we’ve been doing the past three years, it’s not working.  I don’t know how things are going up here, but in Orynth, in Suria and Eldrys and Ilium - it’s not working.  People are dying, Major.  They’re being hanged and beheaded and sent to Endovier, for what’re really petty crimes.  And where they’re not being murdered, or sold into slavery, they’re starving.  You wouldn’t recognize Orynth now.  It’s dying.”  
  
“Are you seriously trying to say that Aedion Ashryver can stop all of that?  You’ve always been idealistic, Rosach, but even you can’t have fallen under his spell that badly.”  
  
Cathal shook his head. “No, he can’t fix all of it.  But we can.”  Dewar huffed out through his nose, but Cathal went on.  “Come on, man.  Imagine the Bane, in charge of the cities.  Yes, with Ashryver at the head of it, but we’d be the ones patrolling.  No more butchering blocks, no more shipping people off into slavery on a whim.”  
  
“But that would never happen.  Adarlan would never let that happen.”  
  
“Why not?  The fighting in Fenharrow is ongoing, and according to Clery’s reports Adarlan’s had to put more and more of their forces down there.  If the King truly believes Ashryver is under his control, why would he not pull his soldiers to aid in the south once Ashryver heads the Bane?”  
  
Dewar tapped his finger against his glass.  “Did he tell you his plans at least?”  
  
Cathal looked away.  “Clery did.”  
  
“So you don’t trust each other.”  
  
“I don’t know that Ashryver actually trusts anyone, save one of his men,” Cathal said with a helpless shrug.  “But I do trust him.”  
  
“So much that you didn’t tell him about Muire, I see.”  
  
“Don’t you dare,” growled Cathal quietly, barely recognizing his own voice.  “Don’t you dare say her name.  
  
“I’m sorry,” Dewar said, and sounded it.  “I don’t want to cause you any more pain than I already have.  Though I can’t say I regret keeping you, and Breck for that matter, from certain death.”  Cathal’s jaw ached from clenching it and he stared at the floor, at a small sunburst pattern on the rug.  “But I don’t understand,” Dewar went on, “how you can ask me, my men - our men - to leave the safety of these hills for a man we know nothing about, save what he was like as a boy.  Even you don’t trust him enough to tell him your own history!”  
  
“My history has no bearing on this.”  
  
“No,” he agreed, “but you not being willing to share that with him?  That says a hell of a lot.”  
  
“It’s not like that.”  Cathal blew out a frustrated breath.  “It’s not that I don’t trust him with the information.  It’s that I just…can’t.  I can’t talk about it, to anyone, even people who were there.”   
  
Dewar’s dark eyes were soft with regret and understanding.  “Well, let’s leave it for now.  I doubt you were so optimistic as to believe you’d win us over in a few hours, so just stay for a bit.  Let us get to know him.  Maybe visit with Grant too, and there are a few others nearby that you might not know.”  
  
Cathal nodded, not willing to show his relief at this small concession.  “That’s all we were asking for.  Give him a chance.”  
  
Dewar stood, and Cathal followed him out of the room.  “Now, where is your young friend?  I still don’t know where Tulach disappeared to.”  
  
“Well, Ashryver will be wherever the food is at.  I’ve never seen anyone eat as much as that man does.”  They walked through familiar halls to the enormous kitchen, where they found Ashryver, of course, sitting at a long wooden table with empty plates strewn around him.  Cathal was unsurprised to see he was already surrounded by more than a dozen men including Tulach, and a half dozen women as well, all laughing as he told some animated tale about getting his ass kicked sparring with one of his former commanding officers.  It was brilliant, really; in half an hour he had established himself as one of them.  They were already eating out of his hand.  
  
Cathal leaned over and said in an undertone, “Still think they won’t follow him?”  
  
Dewar huffed but said nothing, just watched.   
  
He looked back at the table and nearly reeled. Gillies and Fulton were among the laughing men, Gillies standing so close behind Ashryver he was nearly touching him.  He hadn’t even known they’d survived, though it appeared Fulton hadn’t survived entirely intact; he had a wicked scar down the left side of his face, twisting his lip up and distorting his eyelid.  The eye under that half-closed lid was white.  Cathal savagely shoved down the surge of pity that threatened at the sight of his former friend.  Then Gillies rested a hand on Aedion’s shoulder at a particularly funny quip, and Cathal’s vision went red.  
  
Ashryver noticed him then, and concern flickered in his eyes.  “I suspect I’ve been keeping you all from something more important,” he announced, rising to his feet and nodding in Dewar’s direction.  There was muttering as the audience noticed their commander and promptly dispersed.  Ashryver stopped at Cathal’s shoulder, looking at the major with a cocky grin.  “Figured if I was kicked out of your meeting I might as well get to know some of your men.”    
  
“Naturally,” Dewar said.  His tone was courteous, but his face was wary.  That was when Cathal noticed Aedion’s stiff posture, and nudged him with his elbow.  He might as well have been shoving at a boulder; Aedion neither softened his stance nor tempered the aggression rolling off of him.  It was a remarkable shift from the laughing young soldier of moments before.  
  
“We’re going to be staying for a bit,” Cathal told him.  “So settle down, and go find somewhere else to have your pissing contest, we all have to eat in here.”  
  
Ashryver barked a laugh, and after a moment Dewar joined in.  “Come on,” the major said. “Brydie will find you somewhere to stay.”  Cathal hadn’t noticed Dewar’s sweet-faced wife where she had been sitting by the fire, but she rose to greet him and he bent to kiss her softly weathered cheek.  He could barely even hear her chattering at Ashryver as she led them down a hall; all he could see was Gillies’ hand not on the man in front of him but locked around Luthais as his friend strained to get to him.  When Mrs. Dewar stopped at a closed door, he nearly crashed into Ashryver.    
  
“Now, will you be sharing a room or do you need separate?”  
  
“Separate,” Cathal answered hastily, before Ashryver could doom them to sharing not just a room but likely a bed.  It was a relief to close the door behind him and be alone.  Dealing with Dewar had been bad enough - and he still couldn’t believe he’d hit him - but having all three of them standing in one room…He didn’t know how he was going to manage, let alone explain it all to Ashryver, though likely the prince would be too busy to care.  
  
No, he was fooling himself.  Aedion’s reaction a few minutes earlier indicated he cared a great deal, for whatever reason.    
  
Somehow he made it through washing up and eating the evening meal without falling apart or hitting anyone.  The sight of the bruise blossoming on Dewar’s face gave him a sort of savage pleasure.  He kept finding his eyes drifting to it while he talked about the situation in Orynth with a grizzled warrior he recognized vaguely.  Finally the meal was done and he escaped to his room, pleading exhaustion from the trip.  It wasn’t a lie.  He had taken a couple of steps into the room when the door swung open and Ashryver entered.  
  
“Don’t you ever knock?”  
  
“You knock but don’t wait for an invitation.  Figured I’d save a step.”  
  
Cathal could feel the flush creeping up his neck.  “I could’ve been naked in here.”  
  
Ashryver raised an eyebrow.  “That would’ve been some impressively fast stripping, given that I was one step behind you all the way down the hall.  Besides, who gives a shit?  Nothing I haven’t seen, I’ve just gotta look down.”  
  
There was no winning with this man.  “I’m too tired for this shit,” Cathal said, not really feeling up for the verbal lashing that no doubt was coming.  “Just say whatever you want to say and let me go to bed.”  
  
Ashryver paced back and forth for a moment, if the two strides it took him to cross the room could count as pacing.  “What did Dewar say that got you so upset after I left?”  
  
Not what Cathal was expecting him to say.  He flopped onto the bed and stared down at the hands that had fallen uselessly into his lap.  “Nothing.  No, really,” he added as Aedion opened his mouth to protest.  “He didn’t say or do anything I didn’t expect.  It was just…seeing the three of them…”  He trailed off.  
  
“The three of who?”  
  
“Dewar, Gillies, and Fulton.  I didn’t know they would be here.  Hell, I didn’t know they’d survived.”  It figured.  Luthias had died, and those pricks lived.  That was always the way.  
  
“What did they do to you?”  When Cathal didn’t answer, he added, “Dewar told me he deserved the punch, so I know they did something.”  
  
“Ask them, then,” Cathal replied through a clenched jaw.  “Everyone here knows anyway.”  
  
“I’d rather hear it from you,” Aedion said softly.  The gentle understanding was too much to take.  
  
“Get out,” Cathal snapped.  “I got you here, and I’ll help you because I do think you’re the best option for Terrasen.  But you are not entitled to know a damn thing about me.”  Ashryver didn’t move, and Cathal leaped to his feet and shoved at him.  Ashryver gave a step, then planted his feet.  A broad hand landed on Cathal’s shoulder and squeezed, then without another word Ashryver turned and left.  
  
Slowly, Cathal readied for bed, every movement an effort.  But once he was stretched out under the covers, sleep didn’t come.  The room was too silent without the noise of the city, without the sounds of horses chewing and Aedion’s breathing.  The image of Gillies kept intruding, not just of him restraining Luthias but of him tonight, laughing with Aedion, always close enough to touch him.  He kept listening for telltale sounds to start up in Ashryver’s adjacent room, but they never did, and eventually his exhaustion dragged him under.  
  
*****  
  
Mikkal stood on the cobbles of the square, looking up at the glass castle looming over the city.  The first time he had seen it, almost ten years ago when he’d come here with his father, it had filled him with awe.  It belonged in one of the stories his mother had read to him as a child.  Last year, when he’d spent a week drinking and fucking his way around the city on his way up north, it had seemed simply ostentatious, a way for the King to flaunt his power.  
  
Now, as the light of the setting sun hit it, it looked glazed with blood.  Fitting, Mikkal thought, as he turned and walked away, into the city that was teeming with life.    
  
The King had actually thought he would want to train the city guards.  They dragged him up here from Fenharrow instead of releasing him, expecting him to see it as an honor.  Then when Mikkal had showed him his hand, how he could not even properly grip a pen, let alone a sword, there had been nothing but cold disgust in those glittering black eyes.  At least he had been promised a release from service, though first for some reason he was expected to attend the solstice meetings in a month.  His father would be there; all the generals and colonels would be unless they were actively engaged.  The King had told him more information would be forthcoming, then dismissed him.  None of the guards had met his eyes; no one had, save the slender young prince seated behind the King, and the prince’s bodyguard, a young man of perhaps Aedion’s age.  The former had looked at him with kind curiosity, the latter with cool assessment, but neither had shied away from his brutalized hand.    
  
Mikkal wandered the streets, restless, fuming, his brain buzzing with unfamiliar anger.  He had never before been looked on with such pity and disgust, had never suspected how much it would rankle.  It wasn’t that he hadn’t understood the impulse.  Seeing men come home from battle missing limbs and eyes had always caused his knees to wobble, but he had always fought it, always made an effort to talk to the injured like the men they still were.    
  
The night was just beginning, and he passed by raucous parties in every tavern.  He knew there were somewhat more sedate, though sometimes more twisted, ones going on in half the noble houses as well.  Invitations to three of the latter were sitting in his lodgings.     
  
A few hours later he was standing in the drawing room of one of his father’s childhood friends, cursing the fact that he didn’t own any normal clothes.  The wyvern on his uniform was like some sort of beacon for strangers to crowd around him and gush.  He found himself wanting to spar with somebody, to do something to get the buzzing out of his head.  He should’ve just gone to a tavern, where he could drink himself into a stupor.  
  
Finally excusing himself under pretense of seeking refreshment, he found a little breathing room.  A beautiful man with ice-blue eyes had just caught his eye when a feminine voice with a highly affected accent exclaimed “Major Paget!”   
  
Looking down, he saw a young woman with thick dark hair and large blue eyes, wearing a dress cut so low he was pretty sure if she sneezed she’d pop right out of it.  “I’m so happy you’re back in Rifthold, Major,” she continued.  “I had such a lovely time dancing with you last year.”  She looked up at him through her lashes, no doubt trying to be coy.  He stared at her, trying desperately to place her.  He’d been drunk so much of the time during his last visit he probably had danced with her.  Hell, he could’ve fucked her and not remembered, though he didn’t think there was enough liquor in the world to get him to take someone like her to bed.  She was still looking at him hopefully so he muttered something conventional and polite.  Unfortunately she took that as in invitation to take his arm and lead him into the crush of dancers.  
  
After five minutes he was ready to drive his dagger into his own eye if only because then she might stop talking.  To hear her, one would’ve thought they’d shared some grand romance rather than a single dance at a party.  “And I was just devastated when I heard about your injuries,” she gasped, as if they had happened to her.  “My friends said I shouldn’t want to be with you anymore, but -”  
  
He stopped moving, nearly causing a nearby couple to crash into them.  “Excuse me?” he said softly, dangerously.  Before he could say any of the vicious things that came into his head, he shoved her away from him and left the room, thankful to find refuge in a cool dark hallway.  There was a couple there, but they were so wrapped up in each other they didn’t even notice him.  He watched them for a while, thinking back to when Aedion used to pull him into shadowy corners.  Gods, what he wouldn’t give to be at this party with him.  He chuckled to himself to think about how Aedion would’ve handled that idiotic girl.  The couple’s evening seemed to be progressing nicely, the girl’s legs were wrapped around the man’s hips and her skirt was hiked up.  That was his cue to flee; just as he reached the door at the far end of the hall they both let out deep moans.  _Shit_ , he thought, as he glanced over his shoulder at the man now thrusting deep into his partner, the pair of them utterly oblivious to anything but each other.  _I am never going to find that again._  
  
Pushing through the doorway, he found himself in a dimly lit room that seemed to be full of people paired off.  Cursing under his breath, he glanced through the open doorway into the drawing room, where he could see the girl who had accosted him crying with a few friends clustered around her.  “Damn it,” he muttered, and turned to find himself face to face with the man with the ice blue eyes, which at the moment were dancing with amusement.    
  
“Rough evening?” the man said, his sensual mouth quirking up.    
  
Mikkal rubbed a hand self-consciously up the back of his neck.  “Let’s just say I need to practice my escape techniques.”  
  
The man laughed.  “I can imagine a party like this is fraught with danger for someone like you.”  
  
“It’s almost making me miss the battlefield,” Mikkal said, beginning to smile himself.  
  
“Wait around another hour, you’ll go running right back to it.”  Those stunning eyes glanced across the drawing room and his smile turned wicked.  “Or perhaps you might want to make your escape now.”  
  
Mikkal followed his gaze and saw two of the black-haired girl’s friends glaring at him.  “Oh no,” he said in dismay as one of them started to move in his direction.    
  
“Come on,” said the beautiful man, and grabbed his arm.  “I know a back way out.”  He led Mikkal quickly past the couches full of couples, through a doorway, up a wide, ornate staircase, and down a hallway full of closed doors, unmistakeable noises emanating from several of them.    
  
The man glanced back at Mikkal, who arched an eyebrow at him, and he laughed quietly.  “I really am showing you a way out,” he whispered, “though I would like nothing more than to put one of these rooms to their intended use.”  At the end of the corridor was another door; passing through it, they found a plain set of stairs.  “The servant’s,” he said in a normal tone, and began to descend.  As they reached a landing, he stopped and faced Mikkal, stepping in closer until they were nearly touching, their eyes not leaving each other’s.  
  
A surge of long-dormant desire swamped Mikkal, and before he could let himself think he bent his head and brushed his lips lightly against the beautiful stranger’s.  It was a question, and the man answered him fully, taking Mikkal’s face in his hands and deepening the kiss.  Mikkal shoved down the flicker of guilt and let himself respond, not stopping until they were both breathless.  
  
The man’s thumb ran across Mikkal’s cheekbone when they pulled ever so slightly apart.  A mark on the inside of his wrist caught Mikkal’s eye, and the man noticed the look.  His face tightened, but before he could pull away further Mikkal kissed him again.  
  
“I’m not working tonight, if that’s any consolation,” the courtesan murmured when they broke apart again.  
  
“Good,” Mikkal breathed, “because after that kiss I know there’s no way in hell I could ever afford you.”  As soon as the words were out of his mouth he wanted to kick himself, but the man chuckled, his eyes softening a little, enough that Mikkal reached up and touched his lips.  
  
“My carriage is outside.  We could go back to my apartment.”  
  
“Are you sure you don’t want a break?  I’d be happy to just, I don’t know, go to some tavern and have drinks with you.”  
  
“Liar,” the courtesan said, grinning, putting his hands on Mikkal’s hips and pulling him closer.  
  
“What’s your name?” Mikkal asked, pressing a soft kiss under his ear and smiling at his shiver.    
  
“Dai.”  
  
“Mikkal.”  
  
“I know.”  Mikkal didn’t want to know what that meant as Dai took his hand and led him out the servant’s entrance and into a waiting carriage.  As soon as the door closed behind them, they were on each other, hands and mouths roving.   
  
Somehow they made it into his apartment with their clothes still on, though Mikkal couldn’t have told where it was or what floor it was on or what it looked like.  He could have described in exquisite detail, however, what Dai looked like, felt like, tasted like.  The way his sculpted body writhed under Mikkal’s hands, the shocked moan he gave when Mikkal took him in his mouth, the string of gasped curses as he came.  Then the feel of sliding into him, of their bodies colliding, the tempo ratcheting up until finally Mikkal’s release utterly wrecked him, rendering him weak and boneless draped across Dai’s couch.  Lastly the way Dai’s fingers traced the scars where his own were missing, no disgust or pity in those ice blue eyes.  
  
Later, as Mikkal fell into his bed back at his lodgings, he felt wrung out, pleasantly exhausted, for the first time in months.  Yet there remained a hollow ache deep within his chest, one with a name he didn’t dare think of.  He finally drifted off to sleep with his ruined hand pressed over his heart.  
  
*****  
  
Aedion parried, then twisted his sword and stepped in, trapping his opponent’s weapon against his body.  When the soldier stepped back, Aedion twisted again, and the sword dropped from his opponent’s hand.  Shaking his head ruefully, the other man offered his hand to Aedion, who took it with a grin.    
  
This was the fourth man he’d faced that day, and he had finally broken a sweat.  It wasn’t that these men weren’t good, experienced fighters, it was just they had not been pushed at all for the past couple of years.  He meant to change that.    
  
The level field was dotted with men working with various weapons.  Aedion and Cathal had dragged some old targets out from one of the unused buildings, and there was a row of people lined up, bows in hand.  He watched Cathal now, working one of the younger men with knives.  They hadn’t spoken much since Cathal had kicked him out of his room a few nights ago.  After all, Cathal was right; they didn’t need to be friends.  
  
“He’s looking back to his old self,” the man he had just disarmed said from just behind him.  “It’s nice to see.”  Aedion didn’t reply, remembering that this man - Gillies - was one Cathal had mentioned.  “I never thought he’d get over his wife.”  
  
Wife.  Aedion nearly stumbled backwards.  Gillies looked at him, the hint of a smile on his lips.  “Didn’t he tell you?  Muire had water magic.  She was hunted down in the first wave of the invasion.”  No wonder he didn’t want to talk about it.  
  
The man with the damaged eye, Fulton, approached Cathal then but Cathal ignored him completely, the only sign he was even aware of the man’s existence being the tightening of his face.    
  
“Damn,” Gillies said, sounding impressed, “that man can hold a grudge.”  
  
The opening was too wide not to take it.  “What did you do?  You and Dewar and Fulton.”  
  
“We saved his life.”  Aedion looked at him, startled, and he gave a wry laugh.  “When they took Muire, he was going to try to save her, to get her away from the men who held her.”  He shook his head.  “Even if he succeeded, he would have been writing his own death sentence, and they would’ve gotten her anyway.  So Dewar held him, and Fulton knocked him out.  He was still unconscious when the axe fell.”  
  
“Shit.”  There was nothing else Aedion could think to say as his heart bled for Cathal.  “What was your role in it?” he asked after a moment, remembering.    
  
“I held Breck back so he couldn’t interfere.  Fulton ended up knocking him out too.”  
  
“I still don’t understand.”  There had to be something else, something Gillies wasn’t saying.  He wondered who Breck was, where he was, and why Dewar had said he’d deserved Cathal’s rage.  
  
Gillies shrugged.  “That’s Rosach for you.  Great in a fight, but stubborn as a mule.”  He shook his head, watching Cathal walk towards the house.  “He probably still thinks if we hadn’t stopped him he would’ve saved her.”  
  
*****  
  
It was surprisingly easy to avoid Ashryver once Cathal set his mind to it.  The other men flocked to him, just as they had in the city.  In just a handful of days he had set up a much more vigorous training regimen than the loose basics Dewar had maintained.  The soldiers threw themselves into it, especially once they saw how hard Ashryver worked.  There was nobody there who could stand against him, though they all were eager to test themselves.  Even Dewar had grudgingly admitted that it might be possible to get at least a significant proportion of the Bane to follow him.  Extreme optimism coming from Dewar.  
  
All of this meant that other than discussing training tactics, he hadn’t spoken to the prince in almost a week.  Like the rest of the men, he had gotten very lax with his own fighting skills.  There hadn’t been much opportunity to practice in the city, with the Adarlanian soldiers watching every move.  So he spent the bulk of every day working, rebuilding his body, remembering the weight of weapons in his hands.  
  
He stretched out in his bed, every muscle sore.  Finally it was becoming more of a pleasant ache, compared to the painful stiffness of the first few days that even the hot baths couldn’t soak away.  He was nearly asleep when a quiet knock sounded on his door.  Grumbling, he threw off the covers and opened the door to find Ashryver looming in the hallway, wearing nothing but loose pants, clearly fresh from the bath, his wet hair plastered down.  Without waiting for an invitation, Ashryver pushed past him into his room.  
  
“Come in,” Cathal said drily, closing the door.  “Haven’t you ever heard of a towel?”  Ashryver looked at him blankly.  “You’re dripping all over my floor.”  
  
Ashryver waved a hand dismissively and Cathal crossed his arms over his own bare chest and waited, one eyebrow raised.  
  
“We need to get moving onto the next camp.  Grant’s, or whoever’s.  And we need to figure out where we’re going to send everyone.  I mean, we can set up tents here, but how many people can this valley support?  It’s not easy to get supplies here, especially in the winter.”  The words came out in a rush, and Cathal wondered how long the prince had been chafing.  
  
“Aren’t you getting ahead of yourself?  We don’t even have Dewar fully committed yet.”  
  
“Not officially, but come on.  He’s on board.”  Ashryver was right, though Cathal wondered how he knew it.  Dewar had all but said as much earlier that day when Cathal had joined him for a drink in his study.  “We need to plan ahead, I don’t want us scrambling to find living quarters and food.”  
  
“Fair enough.  We can leave tomorrow.  Hell, we can probably go and come back, unless you want to spend some time at Grant’s.”  
  
“We’ll see how it goes.”  With a nod, he left the room, leaving Cathal’s head spinning.  
  
The next day after breakfast, they were on the trail again.  They had just ridden past the men doing their morning workouts when Ashryver laughed under his breath.  “What?” Cathal asked.  
  
“Nothing,” Ashryver said, though his grin proved the lie.  Cathal kept watching him skeptically, and eventually he added, “Gillies is a prick.”  
  
“No shit, but what did he do this time?”  
  
“You didn’t hear him?”  Cathal shook his head and Aedion’s grin widened.  “I probably shouldn’t tell you then.”  
  
“You bastard, what the hell did he say?” Though he couldn’t stop himself from smiling in response.  
  
“You sure you want to know?”  Aedion’s turquoise eyes were glancing at him sideways, gleaming with mischief.  
  
Cathal drew his dagger and pointed it at him.  “Tell me, or so help me, I will geld you in your sleep.”  
  
Aedion barked a laugh.  “You may want to rethink that threat,” he said.  “Gillies said, ‘Damn Rosach, he always ends up with the pretty ones.’”  
  
“Fuck off, that is not what he said,” Cathal said, laughing.  “Hell, I don’t believe he even said anything.”  
  
“I swear to Annieth, that’s what he said.  We can go back and ask him.”  
  
“How could you even hear him?”  
  
Aedion shrugged.  “I’m an Ashryver.”  As if that was explanation enough.  Though perhaps it was, considering what all of Terrasen knew Evalin and little Aelin had been capable of.  
  
Cathal twisted in his saddle, looking back at the men who were now distant enough he couldn’t make out details.  He faced forward again, thinking of Muire’s flame-red curls, generous curves, and sweet smile; of Luthias’ gentle brown eyes, full lips, and warrior’s body.  “He’s not wrong, though.”  
  
“Aw, you think I’m pretty?” Aedion grinned.  “I’m touched, honestly.”  
  
Snorting, Cathal gave him a rude gesture.  “He was talking about Muire, you arrogant bastard.  And Luthias.”  It was the first time in over two years he had said their names without a stab of pain, which caused a strange, different type of ache in his chest.  
  
“Who’s Luthias?”    
  
Cathal looked at him in surprise.  “I assumed Gillies told you about them.”  
  
“He told me about Muire.”  His face was suddenly serious, and his mare tossed her head.  He scratched her neck and she quieted but kept her ears flicked back to him.  
  
“Let’s leave Luthias for another time.”  Cathal could hear the roughness in his own voice, and cursed himself for having mentioned him in the first place.  
  
Aedion nodded and sent his big brown mare into a trot, and Cathal’s horse hurried to catch up.  The reached the end of the valley and began picking their way over the rocky trail up into the mountains, the sun not yet high enough to burn off the mist that always seemed to settle here in the morning.  He studied Aedion’s back as they climbed and it struck him: he was willing to accompany this man anywhere.  He wondered when that had happened.  
  
The trail widened, and he sent Chance up to pass Aedion’s cranky mare.  “Why are you in the lead when you don’t know where the hell we’re going?” he asked as came up alongside.  
  
“Just waiting for you to catch up, you lazy bastard.”    
  
Cathal laughed and they trotted along shoulder to shoulder in a companionable silence.  When the trail narrowed again, Aedion reined back without comment, letting Cathal go ahead.  And so they continued, alternating between riding abreast and Cathal leading, until the next camp, the next hope, opened up in front of them. 


	17. Chapter 17

Cathal was dragging as he rode into camp, trailing two hundred soldiers.  He wanted to blame the heat, but in reality it was just the hundreds of miles he’d ridden over the past few weeks, recruiting throughout the Staghorns.  Aedion, Dewar, Grant and he had barely gotten the new camp location fit for occupation before Aedion had sent Cathal and Grant, along with Allan and Kelso, south and west through the Staghorns all the way to Rosamel.    
  
Grant had signed on to Aedion immediately.  Well, almost; five of his men jumped them upon their arrival.  By the time Cathal had disarmed his man, Aedion had had the rest on the ground, groaning.  He hadn’t even drawn a weapon, using his shield and his fists to disarm and down them.  Cathal wanted to strangle Grant for what the captain had referred to as a test, but Aedion seemed to understand.  And that easy, Grant - and his hundred and thirty men - was theirs.  
  
With Grant came his copious notes about every known surviving member of the Terrasen army.  Three thousand men, all in neat files that Aedion had insisted be brought with them to the new camp.  The bulk of them were scattered through the mountains, but there were clusters in all the cities save Orynth and Perranth.  After an unnecessarily heated debate, Aedion had agreed to take Fulton and Ward to the cities along the coast while the others scoured the mountains.  
  
The camp was a sea of tents and unfamiliar men, and Cathal grinned.  He could hear hammering, and saw a frame going up for a large building.  Barracks, most likely; evidently Aedion’s funding from Adarlan had come through.  He rode straight to the corrals after taking Grant’s horse from him and dismounted, looking for Aedion’s big seal brown mare.  
  
When she wasn’t in evidence, he went to the tent he and Aedion had shared during their brief tenure.  None of Aedion’s stuff was there.  He studied the deserted tent, chewing on the inside of his cheek for a moment, before turning and walking through the sea of tents, scanning faces for Fulton or Ward.  They should have been back by now; should have beaten him home by several days at least.    
  
Finally he saw Fulton’s scarred face and he approached.  “Where’s Ashryver?” he asked without preamble.  Fulton’s good eye widened; Cathal realized it was the first time he had spoken to the man in over three years, but he shoved that useless thought aside.    
  
“He headed North after we left Suria,” Fulton said after a moment’s hesitation.  “One of the soldiers we picked up there said he had heard rumors that Colonel Millar was encamped up along the North Sea with a large group.  He wanted to check it out.”  
  
“And you let him?” Cathal snapped.  Fulton took an involuntary step backward.  
  
Dewar appeared out of nowhere to put a hand on Cathal’s chest.  “How was he supposed to stop him?” he asked reasonably.  “Ashryver outranks him and can outfight him with one arm tied behind his back.”  Evidently Dewar had also been less than thrilled with this development, Cathal realized when he took in his expression.    
  
“I knew I couldn’t trust you,” Cathal spat, ignoring the stricken look on Fulton’s face as he stormed away.    
  
Grant found him a while later staring at the men framing up the barracks.  “The new boys are getting settled,” Grant said, and Cathal nodded but did not reply.  Grant leaned against the mess hall wall next to him.  After a couple of minutes, he added, “I hear Ashryver’s trying to find Colonel Millar.”  
  
“Did you know Millar was in that area?”  
  
“I didn’t know Millar was alive.  I thought all the colonels were executed with the generals.  I hadn’t heard he’d escaped.”  
  
Cathal turned to him.  “That’s what I thought too.  Damn it.”  
  
“Ashryver’ll be fine, you know that.  I’m sure a number of people escaped that I thought were dead.”  
  
Cathal shook his head and returned to studying the builders.  After a long silence, he said quietly, “But what if he’s not?”  Grant looked at him questioningly.  “Aedion.  Ashryver.  What if he’s not fine?  What will we do?”  
  
Grant shrugged.  “We’ll keep on surviving, just as we’ve been doing.”  Cathal turned on him furiously but he held up a hand.  “No, seriously.  Ashryver’s a good chance for us, but we’ve made it this far.  Now we have a sense of who’s alive, who’s around.  We can rally resistance without him.”    
  
Cathal started to protest, then stopped himself.  Grant watched him for a moment.  When Cathal saw his face change he gritted his teeth.  “He’s going to be all right,” Grant said quietly.  “I can’t believe the gods are going to take another one from you.”  
  
Cathal laughed bitterly.  “If there ever were gods, they’ve forsaken this land long ago.”  Without looking at Grant, he pushed off the wall and returned to his tent.  Their tent.  He dropped onto his cot and spoke to the empty one across the small space.  “If you went and got yourself killed, Aedion Ashryver, I’m never going to forgive you.  I will hunt you down in the next world just to kill you again, you miserable bastard.”  Kicking off his boots, he lay down on his bedding fully clothed.  Dropping his arm over his eyes, he pushed down his fear and instead began planning all the choice words he was going to scream at Aedion once he returned.  It wasn’t until he was almost asleep that he realized what Grant had said, what he had admitted in return.  
  
*****  
  
Aedion and Avenar trotted along, trying to make up the time they had lost and get past the narrow pass through the eastern edge of the Staghorns before stopping for the night.  At least it was high summer, and for once the roads were dry enough to not slow them down.  For the seventeenth time he cursed Ward’s recalcitrant horse.  The boy had been so eager to come along on this side mission while Fulton guided their new soldiers back to camp, but fifteen miles north of Suria his horse had shied at a faint rustle.  Ward would’ve been able to sit the shy, but the series of offended bucks the horse threw after had put him on the ground, breaking his forearm.  Aedion had splinted it, then led that gods-damned beast with Ward pale and sweating in the saddle the three miles to the nearest village.  Thankfully, the village had a healer, but it would be weeks before the boy would be able to ride long distances.  The healer kindly agreed to keep the boy until he was ready, and Aedion had set back out, hours later than he wanted to be.   
  
He and Avenar heard the shrill whine at the same time, and his mare spun just as he had taught her to.  The arrow missed her shoulder by inches.  Aedion had his bow off his back and strung and was nocking an arrow when the second one whistled past.  Judging by the arc, it had come from a different angle than the first.  Multiple shooters.  Then a scattering of three came, Aedion knocking one away with his bow and another landing between Avenar’s feet.  The third sank into Aedion’s thigh, and he cursed but ignored it - he had spotted one of the shooters.  He let his arrow fly.  
  
Not even waiting for it to hit, he loaded another, one part of his brain noting that the first had hit the archer in the face.  The rocky ravine walls hid the others, until they moved to draw their bows; the motion caught his eye and he fired.  Another scattering of arrows came at him, but Avenar reared and twisted to avoid them.  He ignored her plunging; he knew where the archers were by then, and picked them off within seconds.  Then he turned his attention to his leg, which was becoming curiously numb.  
  
Yanking the arrow out, he sniffed at it and caught an unfamiliar musty scent; nothing that should have been there.  He cursed again.  Poison.  He clucked to Avenar and released her mouth, and she bolted, all the speed of her Asterion grandsire pouring into her limbs.  
  
The ravine was widening, the light brightening in front of them.  They were nearly through the pass, when Avenar stumbled.  She caught herself and ran on, but slower; then she stumbled again, and went down on her knees.  Aedion leaped off of her, and his injured leg gave out as he landed, sending him tumbling to the rocky ground.  That was when he saw them: two arrows, one in her haunch, one in her shoulder.  She struggled to her feet, and tried to turn to him, falling again.  
  
“Go,” he said to her, as she pulled herself up.  The feeling was leaving his leg, icy pain taking its place.  He waved a hand at her, and she bobbed her head, but didn’t turn away.  “Get out of here,” he shouted as loud as he could.  Two arrows in those locations shouldn’t be hindering her this much, he realized, as she took a stumbling step towards him.  Unless they had the same poison as the one now spreading icy fingers over his body, sapping his consciousness from him.  The last thing he saw were her big, kind dark eyes with the white moon between them, looming over him, before spots covered his vision and all was lost.  
  
*****  
  
The clink of a metal door closing snapped Aedion back into reality, away from the demons and monsters.  He was icy cold, his limbs heavy, slow to respond.  It took him a long moment to figure out how to open his eyes, though his nose was filled with the battlefield stench of blood and vomit, piss and shit and death.  Finally he blinked, finding himself in a dimly lit stone room with barred walls.  With difficulty, he rubbed his eyes, the metallic rustle and weight on his wrist telling him that at least some of the heaviness of his limbs was due to him being shackled.  After several more blinks, his brain cleared enough for him to put it all together.  He was imprisoned.  And the man staring at him through the bars with steely eyes was no doubt responsible.  
  
He pushed himself into a sitting position, almost crying out as the movement pulled at the skin of his back and ass.  Reaching around to touch his back, his fingers came away sticky with blood, and he wondered how that had happened.  The pictures jangling through his mind were impossible to sort into real memory versus fever dream from the poison he had been taken down with.  The shower of arrows he remembered, though it was indistinct, as if seen through a rain-streaked window.  
  
Ignoring the pain, he pulled his legs up to his chest.   He rested his arms on his bare knees to study his captor, who was observing him with faint amusement.  Minutes passed as they stared at each other.  Finally, the other man asked, “Nothing to say, Prince?  I wouldn’t have taken you for the quiet type.”  
  
“You have me at a bit of a disadvantage,” Aedion replied, throat so raw he couldn’t recognize his own voice.  Evidently at least some of the screaming he had dreamed about had been real.  “I figured you’d give me what information you wanted me to have.”  
  
The cold smile the stranger gave should have been terrifying, but Aedion was still too drugged to register fear.  “You’re causing me quite a dilemma, you know.  It’s bad enough you’re looking to reunite the Terrasen army, but you managed to kill half a dozen of my men.  I’d be impressed if it wasn’t such a pain in my ass to replace them.”  
  
Aedion counted in his head.  “Five,” he croaked.  “I shot five of your men.”  
  
The man stepped to the side, and he saw the soles of boots then, connected to a limp body on the floor.  “And then you broke Dean’s neck while you were raging.”    
  
Aedion remembered the crack, somehow, though not what led up to it; that was lost in a jumble of violent dreams that may or may not have been real.  “So why didn’t you kill me?  Why drag me here?”  
  
“I planned to, believe me, until I saw your face.  Then I realized, I might be able to sell you for more than you’ve cost me.”    
  
Finally a prickle of fear registered, but Aedion kept his face neutral.  “I don’t imagine the King will be willing to pay for someone he already owns.”  
  
The man cocked his head.  “The King?  I don’t do any favors for the King.  He’s bad for business.  No, I have someone quite different in mind.  You’re the son of one of the princesses of Wendlyn, are you not?”  
  
Aedion gave an amused huff.  “If you expect to ransom me to my Ashryver family, you’ll be sorely disappointed.  They wouldn’t take me in for free three years ago, I can’t imagine they’d pay for me now.”  
  
“Interesting,” the man mused.  “The Ashryvers have always rallied around their own, yet you tell me they wouldn’t aid you?”  
  
“The bastard son of a dead princess is not of great value to them.”  
  
“Perhaps not.”  The man paced a few steps, still studying him.  “But they are not the only people in Wendlyn who might be interested in you.”  He stopped, tapping a finger to his upper lip.  “No, I can imagine there is someone who would be more than pleased to have you.  You see, I have spent quite a lot of time in Wendlyn over the years, and not just in Varese.”  
  
Aedion’s head was pounding.  He leaned it back against the cool stone walls and closed his eyes as the man droned on.  This man was obviously insane, but he couldn’t puzzle it out now.  After a while, multiple sets of footsteps sounded and there was the sound of something heavy being dragged across the floor; he heard a door open and close, and then the room fell silent save for his own harsh breathing.    
  
He awakened some time later to soft movement.  A girl of perhaps thirteen came carrying a small tray.  The smell of roast meat permeated the air.  She opened a sliding panel in the door of his cell and pushed the tray in before closing the panel again.  Taking a few steps back, she waited for a moment, but Aedion didn’t move.  After a few moments, she gave a bow and left, and he lunged for the pitcher of water balanced next to the food, the chains connecting his wrists to the wall rattling with the movement.  
   
His thirst was so great he almost drank, but as he put the pitcher to his lips he smelled it.  Not the musty smell of whatever had been on those arrows, but something sharp.  It was faint, but it made him set the pitcher down.  He bent to sniff the food, and the same sharp odor permeated it.  Nearly ready to cry from the rawness in his throat, he pushed the tray away and went back to his spot against the wall.  
  
Closing his eyes, he rubbed his thumb over the curving scar on his palm.  Aelin and Rhoe, Evalin and Orlon and Quinn.    
  
*****  
  
The heat in Rifthold was so oppressive most of the wealthy people were fleeing to the country.  Delaney was relieved to escape the sweltering bakery and stroll along the river where the breeze ruffled through her hair and dried the stickiness on her neck.  It was the one time every day she had to herself, that stretch between the end of her shift and when the summer parties began.    
  
It was hard to believe that she could ache with such loneliness when there were people constantly surrounding her.  Yet other than Fulke, there was nobody here she cared about.  Her merchant friends had been through this spring, and she had spent several pleasant weeks with them, but they had moved on and the emptiness that was left in their wake was a chasm she didn’t know how to fill.  
  
She missed Raedan and Aedion, Maida and Avis.  Somehow their absence was getting harder to bear rather than easier.  There had been no news of Aedion since he had left Orynth over a month ago, and she had been too afraid to write to her sisters beyond the one letter she had sent advising them of her position in Rifthold.  It was killing her not knowing.  
  
Sighing, she turned back and headed up through the market square to get lunch.  As she crossed the cobbles, she recognized a familiar tall, angular woman walking alone well ahead of her, one she hadn’t seen in weeks.  She hurried to catch up.  
  
“Cherise!” she called, as soon as she was close enough.  Cherise turned, surprise flashing flashing in her eyes as she saw Delaney, quickly followed by a stoic mask that was disconcerting on that mobile, expressive face.    
  
“Delaney.”  Cherisse could never be cold, but her voice was quiet, flat.   
  
“Are you all right?” Delaney asked.  At Cherise’s blank expression she went on.  “I feared you were ill when I didn’t see you for so long.  I…I’ve missed our conversations.”  
  
Cherise’s mouth tightened briefly.  “Have you?”  
  
“Yes.”  Delaney wasn’t sure why Cherise looked so pained.  “Will you have lunch with me?  We can catch up on all the latest gossip.”  
  
Cherise looked down, teeth worrying her lower lip, before meeting Delaney’s eyes with a cautious smile.  “All right.  Yes.”  
  
Delaney led the way to her favorite cafe, where they ordered and sat at a small table in front.  The initial awkwardness soon smoothed into laughing chatter; Delaney told stories of rude customers and baking disasters, and Cherise had her howling with tales from the Rifthold social scene.    
  
“Oh, and do you remember Major Paget?”  Cherise asked with a broad grin.  
  
After a moment’s thought, Delaney remembered their first meeting.  “The officer without a head?”  
  
Cherise laughed.  “Well, he certainly had his head when I saw him a few weeks ago.  He embarrassed Brigitte in front of all her friends, it was a thing of beauty.”  
  
“What did he do?”  
  
“Nothing, really, just turned her down flat when she threw herself at him in the middle of a party.  She was mortified.”  
  
Delaney joined in Cherise’s laughter.  Too soon, it was time for her to return to work, but the following day Cherise renewed her daily visits.  It was a comfort to Delaney. There was an abrupt influx of high-ranking officers from all over the country for the annual summer meeting and she was living in fear of General Perrington somehow visiting the bakery and recognizing her.    
  
In the end it was not Perrington whom she encountered but Colonel Malins.  Though she had only seen him briefly and over a year ago, she would never forget his malignant black eyes, the cruel cast to his mouth.  The image of him looming over Aedion in that hut was forever burned into her brain.  Thankfully Naise was managing the counter when he appeared, and she didn’t have to serve him directly.  She watched him out of the corner of her eye as he received his order of sweet buns and left, pressing a hand to her thigh to confirm the presence of the knife Fulke insisted she keep on her at all times.    
  
When he left, she allowed herself a slow smile.  She had never used a knife on a living being before, but this… She would put Fulke’s lessons to use happily if it gave her a chance to avenge Aedion.  It crossed her mind to ask Cherise if she knew Malins’ comings and goings, but she rejected the idea almost immediately; it wouldn’t do to have anyone know she was tracking him.  No, for this she would have to use the skills she had honed for the better part of a decade in Perrington’s camp, then tested in Orynth.  
  
It was time for her first hunt.  
  
*****  
  
Mikkal stood in a line of fellow officers, facing the King and his generals.  He had glanced once at his father, who was sitting at the far end of the long table, his face an impenetrable mask.  More than half of the men before him were familiar to him, but it was General Perrington’s black gaze, identical to that of the Duke who sat at the King’s right hand, that drew him.  This was one of the men responsible for Aedion’s torture.  He bit the inside of his cheek until he tasted blood to help keep his expression neutral, and with an effort pulled his eyes away to scan the rest of the council, putting names to faces.    
  
Mikkal stood at ease while the Duke ran down the line.  Most of his fellow officers were aging out of their ability to fight.  Two were awarded what amounted to desk jobs to stay in the program; several others were dismissed outright.  One captain who had been stationed south of Bellhaven had no physical injuries, but was unable to do more than stammer incoherently.  The King and Duke Perrington exchanged a long look, the latter giving a tiny nod when the council of generals pronounced the man unfit to serve.  
  
Finally it was Mikkal’s turn to tell his story and show his injury.  It did not take long for the council to decide, and he was released unanimously, with the commendation the King had promised him.  Bowing deeply, he thanked the generals and the King for having provided him with his career, then joined the other dismissed men along the back wall while the remaining three were reviewed.    
  
Near the end, another man entered, a colonel with eyes the same glittering black as the Perringtons’.  He bent down to speak briefly with the Duke, glanced in the direction of the dismissed men, and gave a brief nod.  Approaching, the colonel’s cold gaze raked over all the men, lingering for a moment on Mikkal, whose skin crawled in response.  Then he took the elbow of the stammering Fenharrow soldier and guided him away.  When the confused man resisted, he paused and, with a cold courtesy, introduced himself to the captain as Colonel Malins.  It was all Mikkal could do to keep from starting at the name, and he couldn’t prevent himself from looking quickly between the colonel and General Perrington.  Not just one of the men responsible for Aedion then, but both of them, here in the city, and he no longer owed any allegiance to Adarlan’s army.  Perhaps his time in Rifthold would not be such a waste after all.  
  
*****  
  
Aedion groaned awake, the pain stabbing through his head enough to nauseate him.  His lips were so dry they had stuck to each other, and when he forced them apart with his tongue he tasted blood from the cracks.  At some point during the day, the girl had come back with a fresh round of food and water; as before, Aedion had waited until she’d left before smelling it.  The sharp odor was still present, so he had curled back up and gone back to sleep.  
  
The man from the previous day - or was it two days ago? - had not returned.  Aedion staggered to his feet, almost falling again as the weight of the chains dragged at his arms, and stumbled over to the pitcher and plate that sat untouched near the door.  Dropping to his knees, he studied them, and reached shaking hands to pick up the pitcher.  The sharp ache in his head, the rawness in his throat, the painful dryness of his mouth all begged him to ignore the unknown substance in the water and sate his thirst.    
  
He doubted it was a toxic poison; if the man wanted to sell him he couldn’t well kill him first.  Aedion debated his options, which considering how severely the room was spinning around him now appeared to be dying of dehydration or risking being sold to the gods knew who.  He returned to his spot against the wall, setting the full pitcher next to him on the floor while he tried to force his brain to work.  
  
The man had been interested in the prospect of selling him to Wendlyn.  Evalin and Rhoe had been adamant that Aelin never go to Wendlyn; they had been nearly as emphatic that he not return.  It was not his Ashryver kin that were a problem.  The royal family may have been indifferent to him but they were not cruel.  Though they had only whispered of it, he knew it was his aunt, the Fae Queen Maeve, that they feared.  The reason had always been a mystery to him.  
  
Not for the first time, he wondered whether it was worth it to continue to fight.  He told himself that there was nobody left who would truly mourn him; but that was a lie.  Mikkal, if he yet lived - news of Aedion’s death would destroy him.  Raedan would never forgive himself for letting Aedion out of his sight.   Delaney…though he hadn’t seen her in over a year, he knew she would tear herself apart.  Three people.  Three people in the whole world who would want him to live, not because of his title or what he represented, but because he was Aedion.  
  
Cathal popped into his mind unbidden.  Perhaps a fourth.  He thought of their easy joking, of the warmth that sometimes suffused Cathal’s face, of him waking Aedion from his nightmare despite the risk to himself.  Of the way Cathal’s eyes sometimes tracked him, when he didn’t know Aedion could see him.    
  
The living warred with the dead in his mind.  In the end, he picked up the pitcher and drank.  
  
At first, the only thing he felt was the glorious easing of the searing dryness of his mouth and throat.  After several swallows he forced himself to stop for a few panting breaths, before drinking more.  He took several minutes to finish the pitcher, and when he set it down the pounding in his head finally began to recede.  He leaned back against the wall, feeling strength stealing back into his muscles, and sighed in relief.  Evidently the unknown substance was harmless, at least in the small amounts added to the water.    
  
Before he could decide on whether to try the food, the rats he had heard scrabbling about became bold enough to enter his cell.  He watched as they fell upon his food, taking their sudden appearance as a sign to avoid it.  Then one of the rats turned and spoke to him in a human’s voice.  In Rhoe’s voice.    
  
Shouting out, he flung himself backwards, as far into the corner as his chains would allow, and still the rat scolded him.  The rat-Rhoe called him a coward, a fool; shamed him for what he had become, for not fighting back, for not dying a hero’s death, for succumbing when they had struck him and tied him down.  
  
When the rat fell silent, another began: Evalin, sweet disappointment heavy in her voice, asking how he could have left Aelin behind, how he could have stayed in Orynth when everyone knew the danger.  How he could have forsaken the blood oath he had been destined to swear.  A rat-Orlon spoke next, scornful in death as he never had been in life; he only spoke two words but they cut Aedion to the quick.  
  
“Adarlan’s whore.”  
  
Aedion covered his ears with his arms, digging his fingers into the back of his head, dropping his forehead to his knees, but he couldn’t block it out.  When he looked up, turning to the rats in despair, they were gone.  The bars of the cell began to warp, bending over him, closing him in, before turning into ropes that twisted around his arms, his legs, dragging him down into a spread-eagled position, merciless and unbreakable despite his screaming, pleading struggles to free himself.  He could feel hands on him, teasing over his skin; they felt like Mikkal’s, and he started to retch.  Finally he vomited, though he couldn’t raise his head and ended up choking the water and bile out his nose.  Drawing ragged breaths, he felt the restraints on his limbs loosen, then disappear.  Exhausted, he curled into the smallest ball he could manage and fell into strange dreams: of crowns of blue flame; of black lightning striking sand, then forming into whips that flayed flesh from bone; of a sword with a bone pommel in a scarred hand; of white light shifting into an osprey that fought like a man; of familiar men, one with dark brown eyes, one with gray-green, searching for something through mist before dissolving into mist themselves.  
  
When he finally awoke, he was afraid for a moment to open his eyes.  Listening intently, he could hear the small movements and low voices of the guards in far room, and then someone breathing closer by; he could smell bile under his face and the scent of freshly laundered clothes.  He risked cracking an eyelid.    
  
No pain slammed into his temple as he let in the dim light of the cell, so he slowly pushed up into a sitting position.  The girl who had brought the food was there, holding a pitcher in trembling hands.  Glancing over her shoulder at the door to the guard room, she crept over to the panel, beckoning for Aedion to follow her.  He did so, remaining crouched to hide as much of himself as possible.  She slid the panel aside and shoved the pitcher at him.  “That one’s fresh,” she breathed, so quietly he doubted a normal human would have heard her.  She grabbed the tray with its full plate of food and gestured at the empty pitcher.  Silently, Aedion reached for it and handed it over, and she slid the panel closed and locked it.  Without another sound she disappeared into the guard room with his tray.  
  
Aedion looked into the pitcher as soon as she was gone.  Wedged into the neck was a hunk of stale bread, and the water below did indeed smell clean.  Throwing caution to the wind, he gobbled the bread in three bites and drained the water in a few gulps then walked back and forth within the confines of his chains for a while, ignoring the grumbling beast in his stomach that had awakened with the bread.    
  
He was still pacing like a caged animal when the man from the first day appeared, crossing his arms and glaring at Aedion with chilly displeasure.  “You look a bit better than when I saw you last,” the man said, the ice in his voice belying his words.  Aedion looked at him in surprise, then realized he must have visited during the hallucinations, or the drugged sleep that hit him afterwards.  The man’s eyes flicked to his empty pitcher, and Aedion realized too late that he should have been suffering from the drug’s effects again.    
  
“I dumped it out,” he said with a gesture to the largely full slop bucket.  His vocal cords were too raw to give him much volume but the man heard him.  “I won’t drink any of that poison again.”  
  
The man’s mouth spread into a smile that was more of a grimace.  “You’ll have to drink sometime.”  
  
Aedion shrugged.  “We’ll see.  I’m not much use as a bargaining chip if I’m dead.”  The man’s nostrils flared, but he didn’t reply.  Aedion waved his hand to encompass the cell and his chains.  “I’m not sure why you think drugging me is necessary given all of this.”  
  
“I’m no fool,” the man snarled in reply.  “I know what you’re capable of.  Consider this a form of respect for your abilities.  An honor, if you would.”  
  
Aedion snorted.  “An honor.  I’m flattered, I’m sure.  And to whom do I owe this honor, if I may ask?”  
  
The man drew himself up to his full height, raising his chin.  “The King of Merchants, you royal fool.”  
  
Aedion’s heart rate went up at that.  He had heard of Dristan Garvey, the King of Merchants, years ago.  Rhoe wanted to have him assassinated, as he trafficked in illegal substances, including human flesh.  Orlon did not generally hold with murder no matter the reason, but had still been considering Rhoe’s arguments when he died.  It was well known that the growing trade in illicit substances in Suria and Eldrys, which had been spreading west into Perranth and even Orynth, was largely due to this man.  He was also rumored to be behind the disappearance of children from city streets; children who were spotted on ships headed south, sold into slavery in Adarlan and Melisande.  
   
“I’m disappointed to find out a man with such a reputation proves to be such a cowardly wretch,” was Aedion’s scornful reply.    
  
Fury flashed across Garvey’s face, and he spun on his heel and crashed through the door into the guard room.  Aedion wondered what he had gotten himself into.  He found out a few minutes later, when Garvey returned with four guards wielding heavy clubs and ropes.  The men treated him like a wild horse, throwing one rope over his head that he couldn’t remove quickly enough due to his shackles, then, after choking him enough to slow him, clubbing his legs out from under him.  As soon as he hit the ground one of the men was on him, shoving a dropper filled with a bitter liquid into his mouth before they all retreated to watch him from the safe zone outside the cell.  
  
Even though he knew they were coming, the hallucinations were worse this time.  Swarms of insects feasted upon his flesh; he could feel their tiny feet and jaws gnawing through his skin, feel them crawling under his skin down to his very bones.  Mikkal stood before him, watching him with empty eye sockets, laughing coldly, mockingly.  Aelin floated in the air, surrounded by her flames, no longer imperious to them - he could smell the burning flesh, hear the crackling sound between her pained screams as she roasted alive.  General Perrington knelt behind him, not touching him, but reminding him of all the ways he had failed those he loved.  In the distance he could hear Delaney crying out, but he couldn’t see her, no matter how he struggled against his restraints.  When he finally collapsed in exhaustion, he dreamed again of Cathal and Raedan, wandering through mist until they were swallowed up and disappeared.  
  
*****  
  
Mikkal was on his fourth drink and not nearly drunk enough.  His father had been on his case for the past three days to return to camp, but he had no desire to be among soldiers, least of all those who would pity him for what he had lost.   Unfortunately he didn’t have an alternative to offer his father; his pay would run out eventually, and he would have to figure out what he could do to survive.  He was still puzzling on this when someone settled onto the stool to his right.  Glancing over, he registered first the colonel’s uniform, then a black stone on the man’s left hand.  He looked up to see glittering black eyes in a hard face as the man ordered a drink.  He recognized Malins from the meeting with the generals.  Heat flooded through him, searing away whatever buzz he might have been developing, and he had to consciously keep himself from tightening up.    
  
The man looked at him and gave him a nod.  “Major Paget,” he said.    
  
“Colonel Malins.”  He fought to keep his voice neutral.    
  
Malins ordered his drink, and the bartender slid it across the bar with alacrity.  Inclining his head slightly, the colonel turned his attention to the bar, where two men and a woman were getting into an increasingly screechy argument.  
  
They drank in silence for a few moments, not that conversation would have been easy with the noise in the room. Malins signaled for another.  Tossing a coin on the counter Mikkal stood, brushing his arm against the colonel’s.  He leaned over to murmur in Malins’ ear, “I noticed you noticing me the other day.  I’d be more than happy to get to know you better.  If you’ll meet me outside,” gesturing vaguely in the direction of the adjoining alley, “I’m sure you’d find it worthwhile.”  Those black eyes flicked up in surprise.  
  
“That’s quite an offer,” Malins said.  “Still, I’m not sure I’m interested at the moment.”  
  
“Aren’t you?”  Mikkal arched an eyebrow with a slow, sultry smile and walked away.  Once outside in the shadows of the alley, he pulled out his stiletto, twirling it experimentally in his ruined hand, then passing it to his left.  He found a deep doorway and tucked himself in to wait.  
  
*****  
  
Malins downed his third drink, considering Paget’s offer.  He was a handsome devil, that was for sure.  Pity about his hand; Malins would’ve liked to take him under his wing.  Surely a man who looked like that could be quite an effective weapon.  A couple more shots of liquor, and he headed out into the alley.  The young man wouldn’t have gone far, but the alley was completely empty aside from rats.  Oh well, he needed to take a piss anyway.  
  
Leaning against the wall, he relieved himself with a satisfied moan.  He shook himself and started to take a step back when he felt a strong arm wrap around him and lips graze his neck.  “I knew you’d come around,” the throaty voice murmured against his skin.  Before he could reply, there was a sharp spasm in his back, just below his ribs, and he reflexively twitched.  A surge of nausea followed, and as he moved to vomit he collapsed backwards, hitting a tall, lean body.    
  
“That,” said the man holding him, lips tickling his ear, “is for Aedion Ashryver.”  The man laid him down gently, almost like a lover.  Malins couldn’t quite make sense of the spreading warmth he was laying on, nor the chill beginning to hit his fingers and feet.  As his breath came short and his vision went black, the last thing he heard was a wild howling, deep within his own soul.  
  
*****  
  
Delaney stood frozen at the end of the alley.  She had been watching for Malins for several days, ever since she had seen him at Luk’s.  Tonight was the first time he had ventured far enough away from the glass castle.  She had followed him into the tavern, had watched as that black-haired man had smiled and made eyes at him.  It had been obvious what Malins had been thinking as he stared in the handsome man’s wake while he drank.    
  
After he left, she had waited a few minutes before following him out.  If there was a tryst planned, she figured he wouldn’t go too far.  The sound of trickling water had attracted her to the alley, and she had watched in shock as a tall slender figure stepped silently up behind Malins and slid a knife in his back, right where Fulke had showed her was a sure place to drop a man for good.  But it was the words he spoke, echoing faintly down the alley, that caught her.  
  
“That is for Aedion Ashryver.”  
  
She should have walked away.  If she were smart, she would melt into the shadows, then join the light foot traffic on the cross street a block behind her.  But she didn’t understand why a stranger in Rifthold would know what Malins was to Aedion, would care enough to avenge him.  Her curiosity drew her like a magnet, and when the tall man emerged from the alley and struck off towards the river, she followed him on silent feet.  
  
He strolled casually down the barren street; the hour was late enough that nearly all the apartments they passed were dark.  When he reached the broad cobbled street that ran along the river, Delaney stopped next to a fire escape and watched.  He reached the railing along the river then stopped and leaned over, and she heard two splashes.  Then he turned and, hands in his pockets, walked downriver.  After a few moments, she followed, clinging to the buildings and being careful with where she placed her feet.  She trailed him for blocks, heading into the slums, until her eyes were watering from the stench she had never gotten used to.  They reached a bend in the river, and the man was briefly out of her sight; when she reached the corner, he had disappeared.    
  
Delaney pulled up abruptly, debating her course.  If he had remained on the river road, she probably would have glimpsed him, so she turned onto a narrower street that branched off the river road, heading more towards the center of the city.  She walked one block with no sign of him, and wondered if he had entered one of the overcrowded apartments that lined the street.  Sighing, she kept walking; it was past time for her to get back anyway.  
  
Halfway up the next block she heard quiet footsteps behind her, but before she could turn or pick up her pace a hand came over her mouth and yanked her back against a much larger body, and she felt the unmistakable bite of a blade press against her neck.  
  
“Give me one reason not to slit your throat right now,” growled a male voice in her ear, and the hand around her mouth dropped quickly to wrap around her ribcage.  The knife at her throat didn’t move.  
  
Delaney did rapid mental math and gambled with her quiet reply, “Because Aedion would never forgive you if you hurt me.”  
  
Whatever he had been expecting her to say, his sharp intake of breath indicated that was not it.  The arm around her ribs tightened painfully.  “And who are you, then, that he would care?” he hissed.  
  
“He is my brother in all but blood,” she said simply.    
  
His grip eased but he did not release her and kept the knife pressed to her skin.  “Prove it,” he said.  
  
She cast her mind about for how to comply without compromising Aedion.  “If you know Aedion, you must know my brother.”  
  
“Oh? Why is that?”  
  
“Because Raedan would never let Aedion out of his sight.”  
  
At that the blade disappeared, and his grip shifted to her arm as he spun her to face him.  He was nearly as tall as Aedion, and she had to crank her head back to look him in the eye.  “Delaney,” he said after a moment.  She nodded, and he cocked his head as he examined her face.  “I see the resemblance.”  
  
They stared at each other in silence for a minute, and she wondered again who this man was.  He was not in uniform, but his clothes were finely made and his features had an aristocratic cast.  His hand on her arm felt odd, and she looked down to see he was missing several fingers. He followed her glance, and when she looked back at his face there was an amused twist to his features.    
  
“Who are you?” she asked at last.  
  
He was silent for so long she didn’t think he was going to answer her.  Eventually, he reluctantly said, “Mikkal.  Mikkal Paget.”  
  
She gave a surprised laugh.  “The officer without a head!”  As soon as the words were out of her mouth she flushed and clapped her free hand over her mouth.  
  
His brow furrowed.  “Excuse me?”  
  
 “Sorry, I didn’t mean to say that.  Obviously you have a head.”  
  
“Obviously,” he replied, and there was humor in his voice though he was eyeing her warily.  
  
“How do you know Aedion?” she asked.  What she really wanted to know was how he knew about Aedion’s history with Malins, but that question seemed like the wrong place to start.    
  
Paget stepped back, finally releasing her arm.  “That is a discussion for another location.  I’d recommend we go somewhere a bit more private.”  
  
Delaney nodded.  “Follow me.”  She struck off confidently, but was surprised when he followed without resistance.  
  
She couldn’t take him to the apartment she shared with the other girls, so she brought him to Fulke’s instead.  His manner was easy but that left hand was always near his dagger hilt.  She wondered who would win in a fight, Paget or Fulke.  Somehow her money was on Paget.  
  
It took almost a minute for Fulke to answer the door, and she had obviously dragged him out of bed.  He let them in without question, though his face was suspicious as he eyed Paget.  
  
“Major Paget, Fulke.  Fulke, Major Paget.  He just did my dirty work for me,” she said by way of introduction, and both men looked at her in surprise.  “He killed one of the bastards that tortured Aedion,” she clarified, and Fulke’s expression shifted to one of grudging respect as he held a hand out to Paget, who shook it reluctantly.  
  
“I didn’t know you had plans to kill anyone,” Fulke said to her disapprovingly.  She shrugged and headed into the living room to flop on the couch.  Fulke and Paget followed her, but Paget remained standing closest to the door while Fulke dropped into a chair.    
  
“So now will you tell me how you know Aedion?” Delaney asked, facing Paget.  He glanced at Fulke, who returned the look impassively.  
  
“I was responsible for training him at my father’s camp,” Paget finally answered cautiously.  
  
“You’re his lover,” Fulke said, not a question.  He laughed at Paget’s expression.  “Turi told us he met an officer who was Ashryver’s lover.  You match his description.”  
  
Delaney had forgotten about those rumors, but Paget’s lack of a denial certainly appeared to be confirmation.  She hadn’t really believed them until that moment; she couldn’t understand how Aedion could ever fall for someone who would fight in Adarlan’s name.  Then again, if this man was willing to kill a higher ranking officer he likely wasn’t a victim of blind loyalty.    
  
“How much do you know about Malins?” she asked.  
  
“Enough,” was the careful answer.  “I know what happened the night he sent you away.”  Delaney couldn’t help but be surprised that Aedion would have shared details of that with anybody.    
  
Fulke looked between them but didn’t comment.  Paget rubbed his good hand over his face.  “I honestly don’t understand what you are doing here when the last I knew you were in Terrasen, but right now I am trusting you with my life,” he said, sounding abruptly exhausted.    
  
“And we are trusting you with ours,” Fulke said.  Paget looked at him thoughtfully, then nodded.    
  
“I like your brother,” he said to Delaney.  “I hope he went north with Aedion.”  
  
“He did,” she said.  “We got word a while back that they were both in Orynth.”  
  
“Are you…” He swallowed hard.  “Are you in touch with Aedion?”  
  
They both shook their heads.  “Not directly,” Delaney explained.  “It could get too hard to explain if something was intercepted.”  
  
Paget nodded, unable to hide the flicker of disappointment.  “I’m going to go,” he said, but he hesitated for several seconds before turning away.    
  
“Major?” Delaney said when he was nearly to the door.  He turned.  “Thank you.  For not slitting my throat,” she added, when he looked confused.    
  
His lips twitched up.  “It was my pleasure to not kill you,” he said courteously.  “Though at some point you’ll have to explain why you thought I didn’t have a head.”  
  
She laughed and Fulke looked lost.  With a short bow, Paget left.  “That was…interesting,” Fulke said once the door clicked shut behind him.  “Do you think we can use him?”  
  
Delaney looked at the door for a long moment.  “I’m not sure.”  She intended to find out, though.  
  
*****  
  
Aedion had long given up on trying to figure out how long he’d been trapped.  Drugged food and water appeared at random intervals, brought mostly by the girl but occasionally by a guard.  Thirst remained his biggest temptation; he dumped the contaminated water out immediately, even though the sound of splashing water nearly drove him mad.  About every third or fourth batch of water was clean, and a hunk of meat or bread would be stuffed into the neck of the pitcher.  He tried to thank the girl but she shook her head and held her finger to her lips any time he started to speak.  It wasn’t nearly enough, he knew he was losing weight and his hunger was a constant ache, but it was keeping him alive.  
  
When Garvey would appear, he would drop into an unresponsive twitching heap, and he seemed to believe Aedion had succumbed to consuming the drugged water.  The rest of the time he paced his cell as much as his chains would allow.  
  
During one of his passes, the rings attaching his chains to the wall caught his eye.  They were a different metal than his chains, and poorly fashioned.  He ran a finger over one rough edge and hissed as it scraped the callus off his finger.  Experimentally, he rubbed one of the links of chain over the area a few times, then flipped the link over to study it in the dim light.  The metal was faintly scored; he couldn’t see it, but he could feel it with his thumbnail.  He grinned to himself.  
  
After hours of working the links near his wrist over the rings, he suspected he had them worn enough that he could break them.  Hoped that was the case, as the rough areas had been smoothed by the constant friction.  But the timing was going to be crucial; if Garvey caught him free in the cell he would no doubt have him darted with more of that paralyzing poison.  No, he couldn’t make his move until he could do it all - break the chains and somehow escape the cell.  He wondered if the girl would help him.    
  
The next time she came bearing food, he met her at the sliding panel and whispered, “Do you have keys to the door?”  She shook her head, looking fearfully over his shoulder towards the guard room and passing the tray through.  “Who does?”  She was trembling, and when she shook her head again he didn’t push further.  He was just going to have to chance it.  
  
It was some time - several meals’ worth - later when the  door banged open and Garvey entered, dragging the girl by her hair and carrying a pitcher.  He threw her down to her knees at his feet and drew a short blade that he pointed at Aedion.  “I should have known better,” he sneered, “then to let this whore bring your food.”  He stabbed the knife into the pitcher, yanking out a small loaf of bread that he brandished at Aedion.  Flinging the bread down, he slashed out with the knife, tearing open the girl’s cheek.  She gave a gasping cry and grabbed at her face, but couldn’t stop the blood from dripping onto the floor through her fingers.   
  
Aedion growled and leaped to his feet but said nothing, his mind racing while he tried to figure out what he could do to help.  They were just far enough away from the bars that even if he broke his chains he wouldn’t be able to reach Garvey.    
  
“No response?  You are a cold-hearted creature, aren’t you,” he said mockingly.  “That’s all right.  You’ll be on a ship in three days’ time, and then she can figure out what to do with you.”  He looked at the girl, whose head was bowed.  “As for you…”   He forced her to her feet and studied her ruined face impassively.  “What a shame.  Now you’re no good to me even as a whore.”  Before Aedion could move, Garvey lashed out again, driving the knife into her chest below her left breast.  She fell with a breathless cry, clutching convulsively at the hilt that protruded through her cheap shirt.  Aedion lunged forward with a guttural scream, pulling up just before he hit the end of the chains, knowing he was too late.  He was unable to drag his eyes from the fine tremors in her fingers as her last rattling gasps sounded over Garvey’s cold laughter.  When the girl went limp, he fixed Garvey with a stare.  
  
“I’m going to kill you,” he snarled.  “I’m going to take you apart piece by piece.”  
  
Garvey was unimpressed.  “You’re going to be gone before long, Prince.”  He spun on his heel in the spreading pool of blood and left.  Shortly afterwards two guards came in and removed the girl, and then Aedion fell back against the wall and wept.  
  
A long time passed before one of the guards came in with food and water.  Aedion had crouched up against the wall on the man’s entrance, facing the sliding panel and watching the man’s progress out of the corner of his eye.  As soon as the panel was open and the man was reaching in to remove the previous plate, Aedion lunged.  The chains held for a split second, almost long enough to panic, but they snapped as he put his full weight and power against them.  He grabbed the man’s arm just as he started to yank it back.  Aedion pulled the arm sharply with all his strength and the clang of skull on metal cut short the guard’s startled cry.  Aedion froze for several heartbeats, listening for a response from the guard room, but the walls and doors were thick and there was no audible reaction.  
  
The panel was too small for the man to fit through, so Aedion had to settle for reaching through with one arm and patting him down until he finally found the keys.  Then there was a the issue of forcing his hand through the bars far enough to enable him to unlock the door.  After a moment’s fussing, he heard a click and felt the door give.  He paused briefly to check the fallen guard; when he found a pulse he gritted his teeth, grabbed the unconscious man’s head in his hands, and jerked sharply, flinching at the loud crack.    
  
The man was smaller than he was, but Aedion stripped him and forced himself into his clothes.  They pulled at his hip bones and shoulders, but he had lost so much weight they weren’t as tight as they should have been, though they were inches too short.  He quickly belted on the man’s sword and dagger, then crept to the door.    
  
His confusion on not having been interrupted was explained when he pushed his way into the guard room and found only one other guard with a mostly-empty bottle of liquor in front of him  The man stumbled to his feet but before he could find voice to shout, the other guard’s knife was in his throat.  Aedion methodically stripped him of weapons, then devoured the remains of the guards’ meal before heading on his way.    
  
A corridor led to a flight of stairs, and Aedion climbed quickly and quietly.  He only encountered one other guard, at the door between himself and freedom.  The man didn’t even have a chance to turn before he was on the ground with Aedion’s newfound knife in his back.    
  
Aedion didn’t know how long it had been since he’d been taken prisoner.  When he pushed through the heavy wooden door of the guardhouse, a muggy twilight greeted him.  He sucked in the fresh air, relieved that there were no nearby human scents.  Keeping to the shadows of the building, he walked around, listening intently for movement or some sort of alarm.  None came.  As his heart rate slowed, he realized that the compound was much smaller than he expected, consisting of the guardhouse, a manor house, and a stable.  It was to the latter that he headed.    
  
He slunk into the stable, all senses alert for any human interference.  A half dozen horses looked up curiously from their hay, and his heart sank when Avenar’s familiar face was not among them.  He had wondered periodically what had happened to his lion-hearted mare, and he hoped she had fought off the poison and gotten away.    
  
Deep down, he knew she was gone.  
  
He shoved down his grief and turned to the horses at hand.  Scanning the options, he settled on a strong-looking red bay gelding and pulled the halter over the horse’s head.  He quickly drew the lead rope over the gelding’s neck, tied it on the far side, and led the horse towards the stable door.    
  
As he approached the exit, a young boy poked his head out the loft above, no doubt awakened by the sound of hooves.  Aedion met his eyes and pressed a finger to his lips.  The boy nodded, eyes wide, and disappeared again soundlessly.   Aedion made it out into the yard, then grabbed mane and jumped, throwing his leg over the horse’s rump and settling on him bareback.  A swift kick had the gelding leaping into a gallop, but Aedion yanked him off the drive and sent him west across the fields.  The horse wanted to balk at the wall they encountered a quarter of a mile out, but another kick had him gathering himself and vaulting it.  
  
They kept their swift pace until Aedion felt the gelding’s strength flagging.  Easing him back to a walk, they kept moving west through the low hills at the northern foot of the Staghorns.  When they came to a wooded area, he dismounted and led the horse as deep into the trees as he could manage, then tied him to a branch and collapsed at the foot of the tree into an exhausted sleep.  His dreams were haunted by the unknown girl, who sat and watched him with mournful eyes.  
  
At first light, he mounted again and they rode until they came across a stream.  Both Aedion and the horse drank their fill, and they continued that way, staying off the road as they moved west, stopping only to drink, eat what edible plants Aedion could find, and snatch a few hours’ rest.  It was mid-afternoon on the third day when he saw the wooden ramparts of the camp.  The exhausted gelding stumbled as they made their way down the hill, and Aedion lacked the strength to even dash away the tears that rolled down his cheeks as they staggered through the gate to his waiting men.   
  
  
  
  
  
    
  



	18. Chapter 18

Cathal stood on the edge of the small patch of grass they were using for training.  Too much of the rest of the available space was taken up by tents, but the barracks were nearly finished.  Everyone was looking forward to being indoors again, and the officers were planning out their training grounds in anticipation.  But for now, they were making due with targets set up along the fence and an area just large enough for sparring.  
  
Fulton appeared along the edge of the cleared area, and Cathal ignored him while he tweaked the footwork of one of the men he and Grant had gathered from the mountains.  None of them were up to snuff.  Once Terrasen had fallen they had all allowed their skills and fitness to fade.  With almost three weeks of intensive training, though, they were regaining some of their former abilities.    
  
After several minutes he stopped the men for a water break.  Fulton still had not moved, and finally Cathal shot him an annoyed look.  He took that as invitation and approached.  “I’m sorry to interrupt, but did you know Ashryver was back?”  
  
“What?  When?”  
  
“He arrived a little over half an hour ago.”  
  
Cathal began moving without even thinking, heading towards the mess hall.  Fulton followed, getting in front of him once he realized where he was going.  “He’s in your tent,” Fulton said, and Cathal stopped at the concern in his voice, searching his scarred face.  “He…he doesn’t look good.”  
  
Cathal took off, half-jogging through the tents until he reached his own, one of a cluster of larger tents the officers shared.  He pushed through the flaps into the sweltering tent to see Aedion passed out on his cot.  An empty plate and pitcher rested on the small table between the cots.  Aedion’s bare feet were filthy, and he was wearing odd clothes that were too small for him.  It was his face that made Cathal catch his breath; it was tight even in sleep.  With his beard grown in he looked so much older than his years it was startling.  But he was alive.  Silently, Cathal turned to leave; he could get his answers later.    
  
“Cathal.”  Aedion’s voice was quiet and cracked, and Cathal pulled back in and faced him.  His eyes were still closed but there was alertness to his face.   
  
“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to wake you,” Cathal said quietly.  “I’ll come back.”  
  
Aedion shifted on his cot and beckoned to Cathal in response.  As soon as Cathal reached the cot, Aedion’s hand shot out to grab Cathal’s arm.  That was when Cathal noticed the black metal around both Aedion’s wrists.  Shackles.  He cursed under his breath as Aedion dragged him down onto the cot, releasing him only to snake that arm around him and pull him tight.  
  
Cathal sat awkwardly on the edge of the cot, trying to keep from leaning against Aedion’s body.  Aedion didn’t say anything more, just kept his arm firmly around Cathal’s abdomen until he fell back asleep.  Long minutes passed, and Cathal spent the time studying Aedion, trying to figure out what got him into this state.  He reeked of urine and vomit and unwashed body, enough that Cathal’s eyes stung.  There were sores under the shackles, though not severe ones.  Cathal wondered how he had escaped from wherever he had been restrained.  When he was done cataloguing he started to become too aware of the heat of Aedion’s body against his back, of the light touch of calloused fingers against his wrist.   
  
Cathal shifted, gently pulling himself out of Aedion’s hold.  He told himself it was only so he could get him more food for when he awoke, and had nothing to do with the pulse he could feel pounding all the way to his fingertips.  The movement had Aedion startling up, eyes wild.  “It’s all right,” Cathal said, holding his hands up, “I’m just going to get you something to eat.”  
  
Aedion groaned and flopped back down, immediately falling back asleep.  Cathal watched him for a moment before slipping from the tent and heading to the mess.  Dewar saw him and jogged over.  “How is he?” Dewar asked as soon as he caught up.  
  
“He’s exhausted.  I don’t think he’s ill, but I don’t know what happened to get him into this state.”  
  
Dewar looked grim.  “Fulton said he looked like he’d been held captive.”  
  
Cathal nodded.  “He’s got broken shackles on, but he hasn’t talked; he’s just sleeping.  I left to get him some food, I don’t know what he’s been surviving on but it hasn’t been enough.”  
  
Dewar started to say something, then hesitated, looking torn.  Cathal stopped just in front of the mess hall.  “What.”  
  
“Fulton…”  Dewar stopped again, mouth tightening, and Cathal stepped towards him, hands fisted.  Dewar glanced at them and started again.  “Fulton just took Hoyle into custody.”  Cathal looked at him in surprise.  They had questioned the man who had sent Aedion north a few times already about what he had heard about Millar and why he had suggested Aedion go there, and his answers had seemed benign enough.    
  
“Does he think Hoyle set him up?”  
  
“Yes.  Cathal,” Dewar said, grabbing Cathal’s sleeve as he started turning, fists already clenched.  “Let Fulton do what Fulton does.  If there are answers to be gotten, he’ll get them.”  
  
Cathal knew Fulton was a better interrogator than he was, but he didn’t want to ask questions, he wanted to beat answers out of the man.  He stood, seething, until another touch on his arm drew his attention back to Dewar.  “Make yourself useful and take care of Ashryver.  He’ll accept that better from you than anyone else right now.”  
  
Grinding his teeth, Cathal hesitated a moment longer before turning back towards the mess hall.  He returned to the tent loaded down with food to find Aedion awake.  Cathal set the plates on the table and turned to face him.  “I’m glad you’re back,” he said finally.  “Gillies has been driving me mad.”  
  
“You’re really here,” was Aedion’s odd response.  Before Cathal could respond, Aedion turned to the food, smelling it carefully then falling on it like a starved wolf.  While he ate, Cathal began digging through his pack, finally pulling out two tiny instruments.  He crossed to Aedion and knelt next to him.   
  
“Let me get those off of you,” he said, and Aedion looked at him in brief confusion before holding out his hand.  Cathal inserted his lock picks into the pin holding the band around his wrist and popped the lock in a few seconds.  Aedion raised his brows but twisted to give Cathal his other hand.  The second one followed the first, and Cathal tossed them both near the entrance.  
  
“That’s a handy trick,” Aedion rasped.   
  
Cathal laughed.  “A handy way of getting into trouble, really, but it has its uses.”  He looked from the iron rings to Aedion.  “Are we going to talk about how you ended up with them?”  
  
A muscle twitched in Aedion’s jaw.  “I need to get cleaned up first.”  Cathal nodded and moved out of his way, but Aedion was looking at the foot of the cot in consternation.  “I don’t have any clothes.”  The disconsolate way he said it made the problem seem insurmountable.  Cathal went to him and touched his arm.  
  
“It’s all right,” he said.  “Let’s go see Brydie.  She’ll figure something out.”  
  
Naturally Dewar’s wife had no trouble finding Aedion clothes, and Cathal felt no small amount of satisfaction when he reappeared at the tent, for once not wearing that gods-damned uniform.  Dewar and Grant shoved themselves into the tent after him and Cathal stifled his irritation.  They had just as much a right to know what happened as he did, or so he told himself.     
  
Aedion didn’t seem to mind their presence, though it was Cathal he watched as he talked.  Several times Cathal was unable to keep to his seat but rose and paced the few steps he could manage in the small space.  He didn’t know what to think, what to feel as Aedion finished his story; he was torn between fury at Garvey and gratitude to the unknown girl and pride in Aedion for figuring out how to break free.   
  
Grant, true to form, began with minute questioning about every detail of the compound, the cell, how Aedion had found his way home, totally oblivious to the exhaustion creeping into Aedion’s voice.  Before Grant could start asking how Aedion took a shit Cathal interrupted.  “That’s enough.  No,” he went on at Grant’s and Dewar’s startled looks, “he’s told us enough for now.  He’s not going anywhere, you can ask more tomorrow.”  Aedion looked a little bemused at Cathal’s interference but didn’t protest, and after exchanging glances the officers left.  Cathal followed them out but ignored them, moving to snag the nearest soldier to ask for dinner to be brought to the tent.    
  
*****  
  
Aedion flopped back on his cot and draped his arm over his eyes.  He was still exhausted but could feel a hint, just a hint, of familiar restlessness prowling under his skin.  When Cathal pushed back into the tent, Aedion murmured, “Thank you.”  He didn’t want to encourage more conversation, but he knew Cathal wouldn’t push it.    
  
He felt Cathal stop by his cot, and freed his eyes to grab Cathal’s wrist and pull him down next to him.  He had a vague memory of having done this already, but when he had awakened the tent had been empty; he still wasn’t sure if it had been real or a dream.  Right now, though, he was undisputedly awake, and he savored the feel of Cathal’s strong arm under his hand, his weight on the edge of the cot.  Inhaling deeply, he took in the familiar scent of resin and leather.  That was what had been missing in his hallucinations, and it grounded him now.    
  
There was an extra note to it, though, a hint of what he thought was fear.  Opening his eyes, he took in Cathal’s tense position perched on the cot, the tightness around his mouth.  “I’m not going to hurt you,” he said, confused.  
  
“I’m not worried about that,” Cathal snapped, glaring at him.    
  
“What are you worried about, then?”   
  
Cathal didn’t say anything for a moment, then, “You should see the healer.”  At Aedion’s surprised look, he added, “You might not have noticed that you’re limping, but I did.  You took an arrow to the leg, and it wasn’t tended for weeks.”  
  
“All right,” Aedion agreed easily.  Cathal remained rigidly perched on the cot, his forearm still taut under Aedion’s hand.  It reminded Aedion of Delaney and Raedan at first, how they would nearly flinch from his casual intimacy; so unlike Mikkal, who had never shied from him.  He released Cathal’s arm and drew his hand back, but there was no softening to Cathal’s posture.    
  
“Why do you keep wanting me to sit here?” Cathal finally asked, just as Aedion was starting to sink under his exhaustion again.  
  
Aedion blinked a few times.  “Oh.  The drug they put in my water, it made me see things.  Sometimes I thought you were there, but you kept dissolving.”  
  
Before Cathal could reply the tent flaps rustled and he rose to meet an unfamiliar young man who was carrying two plates.  Aedion sat up and rubbed a hand through his shaggy hair, trying to dismiss his fatigue.  Cathal wordlessly set the food down on the small table between their cots and sat down to eat.  After cautiously smelling his own and finding nothing amiss, Aedion set to as well, ravenous even though it had only been a couple of hours since he’d eaten.  
  
Cathal finished and set his fork down, sitting back and looking at Aedion with an unfathomable expression.  “Did you really hallucinate me?” he asked at last.  Aedion nodded.  Cathal stood and made to leave the tent.  “I’m going to get the healer,” he said by way of explanation, and ducked out.    
  
They hadn’t even had a camp healer when Aedion had left, and he didn’t know where the woman had come from, but she was gently professional as she checked him over.  The abrasions on his back from being dragged were nearly healed, so she ignored those but cleaned and dressed the sores on his wrists.  Cathal looked more than a little sick as she drained fluid from the ugly wound on this thigh and poulticed it, but he remained even after Aedion told him he could go.  After she left, he couldn’t keep his eyes open any longer and let himself drift off listening to Cathal’s breathing.  
  
The next morning, a grim-faced Dewar brought Fulton to the tent as Aedion and Cathal were finishing breakfast.  Aedion shifted so his body was slightly between Fulton and Cathal.  He had never minded Fulton, or Gillies for that matter, for his own sake but there was no need to push Cathal at the moment.  Fulton spared Cathal a quick glance before turning his attention to Aedion.    
  
“I’ve been speaking with Hoyle,” Fulton said, and anger sparked in his good eye.  Aedion had to think for a moment before placing Hoyle as the man from Suria who had told him about Millar’s camp in the far northeast.  “Evidently he’s had a long association with Garvey.  He knew exactly what he was doing when he sent you up that road.”  
  
Aedion’s brow furrowed.  “But why?”  
  
“According to Hoyle,” Dewar interjected, “Garvey doesn’t want the Bane to gather.”  
  
Aedion recalled his first conversation with the man.  “He said something like that to me, but does Hoyle know why?”  
  
“It’s bad for business,” Dewar said.  “If you and the Bane take control of the cities, it’ll be harder for him to do the type of trade he specializes in.”  At Cathal’s blank look, he added, “Poison, illicit substances, and flesh.”  
  
Cathal’s face darkened but he remained silent.  Fulton added, “On the plus side, he does believe that Millar is still alive, and may have actually gathered some of our missing soldiers.”  He paused, looking between Aedion and Cathal, before saying hesitantly, “But he was a bit startled to learn you were still alive.”  
  
Aedion beat Cathal to the tent opening, blocking his exit.  “It’s all right,” he said quietly.  “I’m all right.”  
  
“It’s not all right,” Cathal spat.  “He’s a traitor.  He was more than happy to sell his country’s best interests out, and your life in the process.”  
  
Aedion dropped a hand on Cathal’s shoulder.  “I know, but let’s not rush to judgment.”  But when he looked up, Dewar and Fulton were exchanging glances.  “What.”  
  
Fulton squared up to Aedion, lifting his chin, stubborn righteousness in his face.  “I executed him.”  
  
Surprised fury rose in Aedion’s throat like bile.  “You executed him?” he snarled, and now it was Cathal stepping in front of Fulton, pressing a strong hand to Aedion’s chest.  “On whose authority?”  
  
“Mine and Grant’s,” said Dewar.  “We heard him, and we got all the information he had.  If we had let him go he would have betrayed us all.  And let me remind you,” he added as Aedion turned to him with clenched fists, “that at the moment I outrank you.”  
  
“Shit.”  Before he could rip into them, Aedion turned and pushed through the flaps.  He started heading towards the corrals but pulled up abruptly when he realized Avenar would not be there to greet him with her low nickers.  “Shit,” he said again, blinking hard against the stinging in his eyes.  He heard footsteps behind him but didn’t turn to acknowledge Cathal.  
  
“Why are you so pissed off?” Cathal asked.  Aedion shook his head and resumed walking towards the corrals anyway.  “They did the right thing.”  
  
Aedion didn’t even know how to answer him.  He had killed several men without thinking just a handful of days prior with no more justification than Fulton had had.  He just wished he could have looked Hoyle in the eye and asked him himself.  He wanted to hear the answers from Hoyle’s own lips.    
  
Reaching the corral, he rested his arms on the top rail and looked over the dozen horses within.  The red bay gelding he had stolen was swishing flies comfortably with Grant’s gray, looking no worse for the grueling pace he’d set.  Cathal stood next to him, almost close enough to brush arms.  “I’m sorry about Avenar,” Cathal said.  
  
“Thank you,” Aedion said quietly.  His lost horse left a crushing ache in his chest, yet with each blink it was the girl’s terrified face he saw instead of the animals in front of them.  “The girl…she saved me, and I don’t even know what her name was.”    
  
Cathal was silent for a long time.  “I grew up with Luthias,” he finally said.  “You had asked me about him once.”  Aedion turned to face him, but he was staring unseeingly into space.  “My background…it was not like yours.”  
  
Aedion gave a dry laugh.  “Nobody’s is.”  
  
Cathal acknowledged that with a wry twist of his mouth.  “We grew up on the streets in Rosamel.  We did everything together.  He showed me how to pick locks and lift wallets.  I taught him how to fight.  When I got caught stealing when I was fourteen, I was given a choice between going to prison or joining the military.  Luthias promised to join with me, so that’s what we did.  
  
“He was the first person…”  Cathal trailed off, but Aedion could guess what he meant.  “We trained together and fought together and when I made lieutenant he was assigned under me.  Dewar knew better than to try to split us up.  And then I met Muire, and he loved her almost as much as I did.  When those butchers came for her, he would’ve died with me to get her back.”    
  
The only noise for a long stretch was the swish of tails and stomping of hooves.  “What happened?” Aedion asked.  
  
Cathal’s eyes flicked to him briefly.  “After Muire, we were sent to Major Ward since I couldn’t work with Dewar anymore.  Luthias held me together for all those months as we watched our country get swallowed up, bit by bit.”  Cathal swallowed audibly, and his knuckles turned white as his fingers dug into the fence rail.  “He died in the last battle.  I…I don’t know where he was buried.”  
  
Aedion’s heart ached with understanding.  He wanted to take Cathal’s hand, but yesterday had made it clear he wouldn’t appreciate that gesture, so he bumped him with his shoulder instead.  Cathal pushed back and they stood there, elbow to elbow, as the painful peace of shared grief settled over them.  
  
*****  
  
A couple of weeks passed with the demise of Colonel Malins being the major source of gossip.  Delaney managed to act suitably horrified to satisfy her coworkers; Cherise on the other hand viewed the situation with her usual amused detachment, though she speculated as vociferously as anyone else as to who could have had motive to kill him.    
  
Delaney made a point to tell her friend that she had met Paget at her cousin’s the night of Malin’s murder.  Cherise laughed immoderately when Delaney confessed she had referred to him to his face as the officer without a head.    
  
“And did you find him as worthy of worship as Brigitte does?” Cherise asked, batting her eyelashes.  
  
Delaney grinned, picturing Paget and Aedion together.  “He’s very polite,” she replied, “but he’s not my type.”  
  
“Mine either,” was Cherise’s response.  Delaney glanced at her sideways, trying to figure out what precisely she meant by that, but Cherise’s sly smile gave away nothing.    
  
They had taken to eating lunch together every day.  Delaney didn’t know what it meant when something in her chest eased every time she saw those gray eyes light up at Delaney’s arrival in the square.  She couldn’t understand why every casual press of Cherise’s hand to her arm, every accidental brush of fingers against the back of her hand, caused her skin to erupt in goosebumps.  All she knew was that there was nothing that could keep her from half-running across the cobbled square to their painted iron table each day.  
  
She was thinking about Cherise as she approached Fulke’s apartment one evening.  It wasn’t her usual day to spend with him, but his hastily written note from that afternoon had her ducking out of the bakery as soon as the bread was set.  Movement in the shadows had her reaching for her dagger; the sudden appearance of Paget didn’t loosen her grip on the handle.    
  
“Is it true?” he asked hoarsely, and she could see the fear in his eyes.  She looked at him in confusion and he went on, “Is Aedion missing?”  
  
Terror stabbed her in the heart and she sprinted the remaining yards to the apartment and threw herself up the stairs, Paget on her heels.  They crashed through Fulke’s door without knocking and he leaped to his feet with a startled exclamation.  A quick glance must have told him the problem, because he grabbed Delaney into a hug.    
  
“It’s going to be all right,” Fulke murmured into her hair.  
  
“What happened?” demanded Paget.  
  
“How the hell did you hear about this?” Fulke asked instead of answering.  
  
Paget waved his hand dismissively through the air.  “Hirons sent a report, one of my friends told me.  Evidently Aedion sends updates regularly but was over a week late so they inquired, to find out he’d disappeared.  So please, please tell me what the hell happened?”  
  
Delaney pushed out of Fulke’s grip to watch his face.  “I got a letter from Clery today,” he started a bit hesitantly.  “Cathal wrote him - do you remember Cathal?” he asked, turning to Delaney.  She shook her head.  “He’s one of Clery’s lost souls, and evidently has been stuck to Ashryver like glue.  They were out recruiting soldiers, and Ashryver didn’t return when he was supposed to.  Apparently someone had told him there was a large camp up along the northeastern shore, and he decided to ride up to investigate.  They don’t know how far out of the way the camp was, but by the time Cathal sent the letter he hadn’t been seen for about ten days.”    
  
“Shit.”  Paget said it under his breath, but in the silence that followed Fulke’s statement it sounded loud.  
  
Fulke turned and walked into the kitchen as the teakettle began to whistle.  He poured the hot water over fragrant tea leaves for Delaney, then lifted a cut glass bottle half-full of amber liquid in Paget’s direction.  At Paget’s nod, he poured some into two short glasses and handed one to the major.  Paget downed it in one swallow, grimacing a little, and Fulke refilled his glass.    
  
“He took the road north from Suria, so Clery has sent one of his best riders to try to track him.  Ashryver’s not exactly inconspicuous, so chances are good somebody will know something.”  Both Delaney and Paget nodded a bit numbly.  Delaney picked up her mug, relishing the warmth against her fingers despite the oppressive heat that still clung to the city.    
  
Paget dropped into one of the chairs in the kitchen.  “I hate this,” he muttered.  He felt the others’ eyes on him and looked up.  “I hate not being able to help him.”  
  
Fulke lifted the lid of something on the stove and gave it a stir.  Satisfied, he grabbed three shallow bowls and ladled the rich stew into them, then grabbed a fresh loaf of bread and began carrying the food to the table.  Delaney helped, while Paget watched in apparent confusion as she set one of the bowls in front of him.    
  
“Dig in,” she said with a quick grin as she took her own seat.    
  
“Why?” he asked, gesturing to the food.  
  
Fulke blew on a spoonful to cool it before taking a bite.  “If you want to help Ashryver, help us,” he said after swallowing.  “You’re well-placed to find out what Adarlan is saying and doing, and we can pass that along.”  
  
Paget dipped his spoon into his stew, then let it trickle back into the bowl.  “Where do you fit in?” he demanded of Fulke.  “You’re from Adarlan, that’s obvious.  I know why she cares about him,” he said, motioning to Delaney, “but why do you?”  
  
“I don’t really,” Fulke replied, shrugging.  “I’ve never even met Ashryver.  But my parents fled the King when I was a boy, and Clery took me in after they were killed.  Terrasen…What it was under King Orlon, and what it’s become…I would do anything to get it back.  Clery thinks Ashryver is our best bet to do that.”  
  
Paget nodded thoughtfully.   “You have magic, then.”    
  
Delaney sucked in a breath, but Fulke didn’t react beyond a pleasant, “No, I don’t.”  
  
“You did, though.  Before it fell.”    
  
Fulke shook his head.  “Of course not.”  But Delaney could hear the strain in his voice and she bet Paget could too.  She wondered how he had realized it; she had heard the story before, both from Fulke and from Clery, and never would have interpreted it that way.    
  
She looked at Paget, and his expression was calm, calculating.  “How did you end up with Aedion?” she asked abruptly, and his attention shifted to her as she hoped it would.    
  
“What do you mean?” he asked, sounding amused.  
  
“I wouldn’t have thought you were his type.”  
  
He chuckled.  “If there was any doubt you were Raedan’s sister…”  One corner of his mouth twitched up as he added, “Your brother didn’t approve either, at least not at first.”  
  
“That’s not an answer.”  
  
“I don’t know,” he said, a sensual smirk playing on his lips.  “Maybe I’m just really good in bed.”  
  
Fulke choked on his mouthful of stew, and Delaney pounded him on the back but didn’t take her eyes off Paget.  He laughed at their reaction.  “No, I was in love with Aedion long before he saw it as more than a flirtation.  That’s what won him over, I think.”  The unexpected bit of raw honesty completely took Delaney aback, and a glance at Fulke showed him in the same state.    
  
Paget leaned back in his chair and surveyed them.  “I think we’re even, no?  You know I killed Malins, I know about your magic.  We all are invested in Aedion succeeding, so now perhaps we can work together.”  
  
Fulke smiled in reluctant understanding.  The rest of the evening was spent discussing what Fulke wanted Paget to do.  The major’s main concern was that he had no way of making a living in Rifthold.  Fulke promised to find him a job, despite his insistence that he had no skills whatsoever.  After exhaustive questioning regarding his interests and contacts in the city, Paget got up to leave, pausing as he reached the door.  “How do we explain this?” he asked, gesturing to the three of them.  “It’s not like we move in the same circles.”  
  
Fulke chewed on his lip as he looked between Paget and Delaney.  “Er…”  
  
Delaney recognized his idea first.  “No.  No way, it’s not believable.”  
  
Paget caught on.  “Actually…that could work.”  
  
She rounded on him.  “No.  You’ve turned down aristo girls, there’s no reason for you to look twice at someone like me.”  
  
Paget huffed.  “You can hold your own in the looks department, and I’m not nobility.  You’ll be doing me a favor,” he went on when she opened her mouth to protest again.  “I can finally get these damn girls off my back.  And you know I’m…safe.”  
  
She glared at both of them in exasperation.  Paget shrugged and started to open the door.  “You don’t need to decide tonight,” he said, with a slight bow.  “But we do need to come up with a plausible excuse for me to start spending time with you.”    
  
As Paget’s footsteps sounded down the stairs, Fulke waved at Delaney to follow him, and with a rude gesture at Fulke she obeyed.  Paget must have heard her coming, for he was waiting at the bottom of the stairs.  He held an arm out to her, but lowered it with a laugh after taking in her expression.  
  
They walked towards the bakery largely in silence.  As they got close, Delaney stopped and turned to Paget.  “Why didn’t you go after him?  Once you were discharged, I mean.”  
  
He studied her for a long moment, expression unreadable.  “A few reasons.  Two, really.  I was afraid my presence would put him in danger, either from Adarlan or from soldiers in Terrasen who might not look too kindly on us being together.  And the other…I don’t know that he wants me there.”  
  
“Why wouldn’t he?”  
  
“Definitely no doubt you’re Raedan’s sister,” he said, but there was no humor in his tone this time.  When she didn’t look away, he blew out a long sigh.  “Why does it matter?”  
  
“It just does.”  
  
He dropped his eyes to the cobbles, then glanced back up at her.  “I…wasn’t completely honest with him,” he said softly.  “And he found out in the worst possible way.”  
  
“Were you with someone else?” Delaney asked, her voice hard.  
  
He laughed, and there was heartbreak in the sound.  “No, it wasn’t that.  I would never do anything to hurt him.”  The emphasis on the last word had her furrowing her brow.  “I hated being a soldier,” he went on, so quietly she had to step closer to hear him.  “And he knew that, but he didn’t know that…that I didn’t always care if I made it off the battlefield.  Until this.”  He held up his hand, and she stared at the lumpy scars where his fingers had been.    
  
“Oh,” she said faintly.  
  
He started walking again, and after a moment she followed after him, a thousand questions burning her throat as she swallowed them down.  When they reached the bakery she hesitated before unlocking the door, searching his face but not finding any answers.    
   
“Good night, Major Paget,” she finally said.  
  
“Mikkal,” he said.  “Call me Mikkal.”  With another shallow bow, he turned and disappeared into the night.  
  
*****  
  
Days passed, then weeks.  The leaves began to change, and Aedion found himself marveling at how easy it was to fall into routine.  While each war camp certainly had its own feel, the day to day life was the same.  Once he was eating enough he recovered quickly from his injury, and within a few days of his return had been back to training his new men.  Others continued to trickle in; former members of the Bane who had heard about the raising, and some young men and boys who had not been old enough to fight in the war but who wanted to help now.  The first barracks building was finished, but soon filled to overflowing and a second was begun immediately along with rough stables for the horses.  Winter came early this far north and they needed to have everyone under a roof before the first snow fell.  
  
One afternoon, a solo man rode in and headed straight for where Aedion was supervising a sparring session.  When he looked up at the horse approaching him and saw the rider he called for a halt.  By the time Raedan had dismounted, Aedion was at his side to pull him into a hug, ignoring the stares of all the men around them.  “I didn’t know you were coming up here!”  
  
Raedan grinned as he was released.  “Well evidently someone needs to be with you at every moment or you’ll get yourself killed.”  
  
Aedion laughed.  “I hope the others are managing in Rifthold without you.”  
  
“Hirons has basically taken over,” Raedan said.  “Once he received his promotion, and thank you for that by the way,” he went on, gesturing at his lieutenant’s stripes, “the entire garrison started looking to him instead of that fool Longe.”  
  
They walked side by side to the corrals, where one of the young new recruits took Raedan’s horse.  Raedan grabbed his pack and saddlebags and followed Aedion first to the mess hall, then to the tent he still shared with Cathal, chattering all the way about the news from the city and from Adarlan.  Once they had ducked into the empty tent, Raedan reached into the saddlebag and pulled out a large stack of paper.  “Your letters,” he said.  “Looks like I’ll never get away from being your page.”  
  
Aedion snorted and took the stack as he dropped onto the lone chair that had made its way into the tent.  There were several official communications from Adarlan, most of which Raedan or someone had opened.  “Sorry about that,” Raedan said as Aedion flipped open a broken seal.  “We decided to monitor those while you were missing.”  There were orders for Rifthold, which were better dealt with by Hirons anyway; the authorization of the promotion of Aedion’s men that he had requested months ago; and one letter that detailed a rebel camp that was rumored to be north of Rosamel in the western part of the country.  The implication was that Aedion was to destroy or assimilate the rebels.  He set that aside to address with Dewar, Grant, and Cathal later.    
  
A handful of letters were unopened, and he started on those.  The first one he ripped open made his jaw drop.  “Colonel?” His voice was hoarse, and he cleared his throat and handed the letter to Raedan.  “They made me colonel.”  
  
Raedan skimmed the letter and handed it back with a grin.  “Looks that way.  I guess they decided you can’t run this camp as a captain.”  
  
There was a rustling as Cathal entered the tent then pulled up abruptly, looking between the two of them, at Raedan’s grin and Aedion’s pallor.  “When did you get here?” he asked gruffly, moving between them with a remarkable lack of subtlety.    
  
Aedion handed him the letter as Raedan answered, “About an hour ago.”  Cathal didn’t acknowledge him, just stared in stunned silence at the letter.    
  
“Damn,” Cathal said at last, passing the paper back to Aedion.  “Can I be there when you tell Dewar and Grant?  I need to see their faces.”   
  
Aedion laughed and snagged the next letter while Cathal stepped back and sat on his cot.  It was a long letter from Clery, and Aedion read it quickly, then went back and reread a couple of passages, blinking through the stinging in his eyes.    
  
“What is it?” Raedan asked, concerned at whatever he saw on Aedion’s face.  
  
“It’s Mikkal,” he said, unable to drag his gaze away from the paper.  “He’s in Rifthold.  With Delaney.”  Raedan gave a low curse and moved to read over Aedion’s shoulder.  Aedion looked up at him as Raedan squeezed his shoulder almost hard enough to bruise.  “They’re all right,” Aedion whispered.  “And look…”  
  
“Holy shit,” Raedan said, sounding awed.  “He killed Malins.  I knew I liked him.  Wait, does Clery even know who Malins was?”  
  
“Not unless Delaney told him.”   
  
Cathal was watching them intently.  “Mikkal is…”  
  
Aedion met Cathal’s eyes.  “Mikkal is that officer you rode me so hard about when we first met,” he said.  
  
“The one who was wounded.”    
  
Aedion nodded.  “This is the first proof I’ve had he survived.”  He didn’t miss the tightening of Cathal’s face, the hardening of his mouth, or the bob of his throat before he spoke again.  
  
“And who did he kill?”    
  
Raedan looked at Aedion, concern in his eyes.  Aedion dug his nails into his palms, feeling each small line of pain as a buffer against the bile that threatened to rise in his throat.  “Colonel Malins.  One of the men who…tortured me.”  
  
Cathal’s whole body went rigid for a moment, then relaxed.  “Good,” was all he said.  With a quick glance at Raedan, he ducked back out of the tent.  
  
“Gods, Aedion,” Raedan said, staring after Cathal.  “What is it with you and officers?”  
  
“What?”  Aedion saw the amused exasperation in his expression and looked at the tent opening.  “Oh.  No.  Cathal has no interest in me.  Trust me,” he added, noting Raedan’s skepticism.  “No, it’s…he lost someone in battle.  I’m sure it’s hard for him to hear when someone else gets lucky.”  Raedan didn’t comment further and Aedion let it drop.  Cathal had made himself plenty clear.  
  
 *****  
  
Cathal was right: he would remember the expressions on Dewar’s and Grant’s faces at the news of Aedion’s promotion for the rest of his life.  They had to have known it was inevitable; Aedion could hardly enact a routing of a country full of rebels as a captain.  Yet both were shocked, and Dewar was unable to completely hide his frustration.  No doubt the presence of a stranger from Adarlan didn’t make it any easier, though by some miracle Raedan kept his mouth shut.  
  
Dewar’s discomfiture almost made up for the unexpected news regarding Aedion’s lover.  Cathal hated himself for resenting it, but it seemed to erase that moment of perfect understanding between them after Aedion’s return.    
  
It wasn’t until late that night when they were finally alone, Raedan having claimed a bed in the not quite completed barracks.  Cathal debated not saying anything, but in the end his mouth won out.  “Are you bringing him here?” he asked as Aedion was settling into his cot.    
  
“Who?”  
  
“Mikkal.”  Cathal didn’t know why the name was so hard to say, nor how to explain the surge in his gut when Aedion shook his head.  “Why not?”  
  
Aedion was quiet for a long moment.  “I think he needs to move on from this life,” he finally said.  “The injuries he sustained…he won’t be able to fight anymore.  And I think he doesn’t want to.  I will never not be a soldier, and it’s not fair to him to drag him back towards war.”  
  
Cathal turned out the light and settled into his own cot.  “Does he deserve you?” he asked into the dark.  
  
Aedion let out a long breath.  “He deserves peace, and that is not me.”  
  
“I hope he finds it, then.  I hope there is such a thing.”  And as Aedion’s breathing smoothed out Cathal said a silent prayer to the gods he didn’t believe in, that in this world or the next peace could be found.  
  
*****  
  
Delaney seriously wished the cobbled street beneath her chair would open up and swallow her when she spotted Mikkal crossing the square her next day off after their run-in at Fulke’s.  Cherise noticed her distraction immediately, and before she could comment the source himself strode to their little table.  
  
“Delaney,” Mikkal said with a bow.  
  
“Major Paget,” she replied.  He raised his brows at her with an expectant smile, and she added, “Mikkal.”  
  
Cherise looked between them in confusion, and Delaney introduced them.    
  
“We’ve met, of course,” Mikkal said smoothly, and Cherise replied in the affirmative.  
  
Mikkal turned back to Delaney.  “Please, tell your cousin that I appreciate his assistance.  I believe the new job will work out nicely.”  
  
“Did he find you a job?” she asked, surprised.    
  
“Yes, as a singing instructor.  I’m not sure I’m qualified, but I won’t complain.”  
  
Cherise gave her sly smile.  “You’re qualified,” she assured him.  “Most of the young ladies I know who take singing lessons care far less about improving their voice than looking at their teacher.”  
  
He flushed but laughed good-naturedly.  “Thank you, I think,” he said.  “Sorry to interrupt, please, enjoy your lunch.  I hope to see you soon, Delaney.”  With another bow and a lingering smile, he left.  
  
Looking at Cherise’s face, Delaney cursed to herself.  She was going to have to talk to him, he was a little too good at this.    
  
“I thought you said he wasn’t your type,” Cherise said, picking up her fork.  
  
“He’s not,” Delaney reassured her.  “He’s become friendly with my cousin, so I’ve seen him there a couple of times.”  
  
Cherise chewed thoughtfully for a moment.  “Well, it would appear you’re his.”  
  
Delaney reminded herself that she needed people to buy into this ridiculous charade.  That the sinking feeling was only because she was lying to her friend.  With a shrug, she returned to her meal, and after a minute Cherise began discussing a book she had loaned Delaney.    
  
After lunch, they went for a walk along the river, and then Delaney had to head back to the bakery to change to meet Fulke for training.  She was even more eager than usual, as she hoped he had news of Aedion.  As they cut between buildings to shorten the walk back, Cherise abruptly stopped.  Confused, Delaney turned to face her.  
  
Cherise looked like she was steeling herself to say something, but remained quiet, staring intently at Delaney instead.  Delaney felt her face get hot, and tried to ignore the fluttering in her stomach as she held her gaze.  With a deep breath, Cherise closed the small distance between them and kissed her.  
  
Delaney had never been kissed, not like this. She had never realized how the feel of soft lips on hers could cause the ground to drop out from under her feet; had never known that her mouth was connected so strongly to her heart, but she could feel her pulse in every corner of her body.  Cherise’s fingers wound their way into her hair and Delaney gave a small moan and leaned into her, opening her mouth instinctively to the gentle question of Cherise’s tongue.  
  
When Cherise pulled away, too soon, Delaney had to blink to clear her vision.  Cherise’s gray eyes were serious for once as she brushed Delaney’s cheek lightly with her thumb, searching for an answer to her wordless question.    
  
“I told you Mikkal wasn’t my type,” Delaney said, reaching up to draw Cherise back down.  With a low chuckle, Cherise obeyed the silent command.  They stood in the shadow of the building, lost to the bustling city and found in each other’s arms.


	19. Chapter 19

Aedion didn’t know why he had expected anything different.  Gritting his teeth as Dewar pushed back yet again, he tried to tell himself that he would feel the same way, he would resent someone so much younger and less experienced suddenly outranking him.  After all, it was only his second time meeting with the other officers since his promotion and it was probably a miracle the others were falling in line so quickly.  So he listened and ignored the hint of condescension, and when Dewar paused for breath, said, “I understand that we need to get Adarlan out of the cities, I agree with you.  But I can’t ignore my orders from Adarlan and expect to remain in Terrasen.”    
  
When Dewar opened his mouth to argue back, Aedion went on as if he hadn’t noticed.  “They will either pull me or kill me if I don’t at least make a show of this.  I can’t help you if they don’t trust me, and at this point I’ve done precious little to deserve that trust.”  
  
“You haven’t done a hell of a lot to earn our trust either,” Dewar snapped.  Cathal, who had been uncharacteristically silent up to this point, bristled.  Even Gillies and Kelso looked uncomfortable.  All three settled back into their chairs at a look from Aedion.  
  
“Fair enough,” Aedion said calmly, though with steel in his tone.  “I thought perhaps you might have appreciated that I’m responsible for the thousand men who are sitting on the other side of that wall instead of scattered to Hellas knows where.  I thought you might have noticed that I established a training program for soldiers who had been farming and tending bar and selling goods for the past three years.  I also thought it might have piqued your interest that thanks to me Adarlan funded the building we’re sitting in at the moment and will be paying for the food these men need to get through the winter.”  He planted a hand on the table in front of him, leaning towards Dewar but leashing his snarl.  “But you’re right.  I haven’t done enough for Terrasen, not yet.  
  
“The thing is, you’re asking for me to basically drive Adarlan out of the country immediately.  We have a thousand soldiers.  They have a hundred thousand.  We have no more monarch, no universally recognized ruler.  They have a king whose family has ruled for a thousand years.  I’ve only been back in Terrasen for seven months and I have no right to the throne.  If I want to help for more than the three weeks it would take for them to send some assassin up to kill me, I have to work within their orders, not openly against them.”  
  
Grant spoke up when Dewar sat back, still fuming.  “We knew, my friend,” he said quietly.  “We knew that a direct confrontation was impossible.  You were the one who always said it would only end in slaughter.”  
  
“I’m just trying to figure out why it’s the eighteen year old who’s being the rational one of the two of you,” Cathal interjected.  “You’ve always harped on me for my hot-headedness but you’re looking to send us on a suicide mission.  You haven’t been living in the city so maybe you don’t understand, but if we attempt to drive the garrisons out now we’ll all die.  Why do you think we were so reticent these past years?  Laziness?”  
  
Dewar lifted up a sheaf of paper, then let it drop back on the table.  “More people have gone to the butchering blocks.  More people are being sent to die in Endovier.  If we can’t stop it, what’s the point?”  
  
“The numbers are going down, at least in Orynth,” Aedion said.  “If you’d talk to Raedan, he’d explain.  But we need to pull the rebels out of the cities entirely or convince them to stand down.  Hirons can only control so much, and only in Orynth.”  
  
“It’s interesting you put so much faith in your Adarlan officers,” Dewar sneered.  
  
Aedion shrugged.  “There are still some good men in Adarlan,” he said.  “The men I brought are just as unhappy with the treatment of innocents as we are.”  
  
Dewar looked around the table, at the men he had known for years all rallying to Aedion’s side.  “Fine.  Fine.  But we can’t sit here all winter and do nothing.”  
  
“What do you propose?”  Aedion asked the whole table, and was surprised when it was Kelso who spoke up.  
  
“You said that you had received information about a rebel camp north of Rosamel, right?”  Aedion nodded, and Kelso went on.  “What if that’s Colonel Millar?”  Everybody looked startled at that possibility, and Aedion nodded encouragement.  “Whats-his-name, the traitor, he said he believed Millar is still alive, but when we sent the riders east there was nothing.  We,” gesturing to Grant and Cathal, “didn’t go that far north, and we didn’t hear any rumors, but that part of the Staghorns isn’t well-settled.  So I propose we send riders to that location to scout and see who’s there.”  
  
Grant nodded thoughtfully.  “That would be a decent hiding spot, close to the wolf tribe.  Lots of ghost leopards though, we better send someone who’s a good shot.  Not you,” he said to Aedion.  “We’re not risking you again.”  
  
“How many do you think we should send?” Dewar asked, not willing to let the other men take over too much.  
  
“No more than five,” Aedion said, “and we need to get them on the road within a week.  Get me a list of ten candidates and we’ll whittle it down from there.  We done here?”  Everyone nodded and rose to their feet when he stood.  He left the room first, clapping Kelso on the shoulder as he passed, and headed to the kitchen to snag some food.  
  
Raedan intercepted him.  “We’re going into town,” he announced, steering Aedion towards the corrals.  The sound of hammering got louder as they approached, and Aedion was relieved to see good progress being made on the rough stables they were putting up.  He hadn’t been to the small town near camp yet, and Raedan gave him an incredulous look when he commented on that fact.  
  
Aedion stopped before the gate, studying the milling horses within.  Raedan ducked between the rails, then turned back when he realized Aedion wasn’t following.  “What’s wrong?”  
  
“I haven’t ridden since I got back,” he said, relieved he managed to keep the roughness from his voice.  
  
“Seriously?  It’s been what, six, eight weeks?  Have you ever gone more than two days without riding?”  
  
Aedion shrugged, aiming for casual but failing.  “It’s just…I can’t believe she’s gone.”  
  
Raedan walked back and leaned on the top rail.  “I get it.  I do.  I know she meant so much to you.  But you need to ride, Aedion.  And not just for practical reasons.”    
  
Sighing through his nose, Aedion grabbed a halter and found the gelding who had brought him home.  Evidently someone had been attending him in Aedion’s absence, as his coat gleamed and his shoes were new.  Aedion took some time fitting him to one of the saddles, since his own was gone with his mare, and borrowed a bridle.  He’d have to get new equipment, but for now he’d keep this horse.  The gelding had, after all, saved his life.    
  
They spent the ride debating what to name the horse.  Raedan’s unflattering suggestion of “Jughead” was nearly met with violence despite its accuracy.  Aedion finally settled on Marcra, an Old Language word he had always liked.  They entered the small town, looking around with interest.  There was a tavern and a general store, a tailor and a shoemaker, and a small bakery.  After tying their horses, they went into the bakery first so Aedion could stuff a large sweet roll into his mouth.  Next was the general store and Raedan led Aedion straight to the small selection of books.  
  
“I noticed you didn’t have any,” he said, gesturing to the shelves.  “I figured you better get comfortable here if you’re going to be spending the winter.”    
  
It was such a small gesture, but it reminded Aedion why he always felt better when Raedan was around.  With a broad grin, he perused the titles and found a couple that interested him.  He then browsed through the rest of the store.  He really needed to replace the dagger he had lost, as the one he had gotten from the camp armory was of barely average quality and didn’t sit right in his hand, but of course there was nothing of the kind to be had.    
  
After paying for his books, they went to the tavern.  Only a handful of people were inside, and while they looked at Aedion curiously they didn’t approach.  During the meal, Aedion told Raedan about the meeting with the other officers.  It still irritated him that Dewar had made it clear Raedan wasn’t welcome - he was a lieutenant, after all, even if he hadn’t had the formal training - but Raedan laughed when he said as much.  “It’s not like you don’t tell me everything anyway,” he said.  “And no doubt they talk more freely without me there.”       
  
They were nearly done with their meal when three young women entered the tavern, and Aedion’s focus immediately fixed on them.  One in particular caught his eye, dark haired and dark eyed and curvy.  A different sort of hunger than that he had been sating stirred in his abdomen, and he had trouble keeping in his seat when the woman met his look with an appraising one of her own.  
  
Raedan noticed, of course.  “I take it I’m riding back alone?”  
  
Aedion shrugged, not looking away from the women.  “Or you could partake as well.”  
  
When Raedan didn’t reply, Aedion tore his gaze away to look at his friend.  “Kenna,” was all Raedan said, shrugging.  Aedion’s brows went up but he didn’t comment.  “How long has it been, anyway?” Raedan asked, nodding his head in the direction of the women.  
  
“Um.”  Aedion thought.  “Since Orynth.”  
  
“What?  You’re joking.”    
  
Aedion shook his head.  “Not a lot of available women around.”  
  
“Yeah, but that’s not your only option, is it?  I mean, you said Cathal wouldn’t, but I’d put money on Gillies being willing.”  
  
“I can’t fuck Gillies.”  
  
“Why the hell not?  You’ve never been fussy before.”  
  
Aedion thought of having male hands on him that he didn’t love, and shuddered.  “I just…can’t.”  Imagining Cathal’s horrified reaction added to his reluctance, but he couldn’t explain that to Raedan.  Thankfully he didn’t need to.  
  
“Well, you’ve got to figure something out.  You’re much less of an ass when you’re getting laid regularly.”  Aedion barked a laugh and finished his meal, though his eyes rarely strayed from the table the women had settled at.  
  
An hour later, Raedan was on his way back, and Aedion was in the black-haired woman’s small house, exercising all his self control to keep from pushing too far, too fast.  He was grateful that Ailsa seemed nearly as eager as he was, her work-roughened hands finding their way under his shirt as their tongues slid along each other.  They didn’t even make it to her bedroom, settling for the couch in the dark front room, and he relished tasting every inch of her as he stripped her.  Only when she was writhing under his hands and teeth and tongue, nearly begging him, did he let himself sink into her.  He growled, low in his throat, as he lost himself in the slick warmth, forgetting himself completely as deeper instincts took over the ripple of his muscles and drove him towards release.  
  
*****  
  
Cathal grumbled to himself as he headed back towards the mess hall.  Aedion had disappeared after the meeting had concluded hours ago, and Cathal had been looking for him since he hadn’t shown up for the evening meal.  A check at the corrals showed his bay horse was missing, and the guards reported with some concern that he and Raedan had left, but nobody knew where they went.  Cathal wanted to strangle him for his irresponsibility, though despite the guards’ fears he was no doubt safe with Raedan.  
  
The hall was still full, the soldiers needing to eat in waves as it had not originally been built to accommodate this many.  He ate with a handful of Grant’s men and mulled over the plan to head west.  They had perhaps a month before snow closed the passages through the Staghorns, and of yet they still didn’t know if the camp in question was in the mountains or north of them.    
  
He headed back to their tent.  There was a house being built for Aedion, Dewar, and Grant to share but it wasn’t ready yet.  The debate about a separate house being built versus stuffing the high-ranking officers into the private wing of the barracks had been long and vociferous.  True to form Aedion hadn’t cared either way so it was up to the others to decide what was more appropriate.    
  
As he neared the tent, he saw a lone horse crossing the camp and a split second later recognized Raedan.  Picking up a jog, he intercepted him.  “Where’s Aedion?” he asked, not trying to keep the bite out of his voice.  
  
“In town,” Raedan replied.  
  
“You left him there alone?”  Cathal was incredulous at the stupidity.  
  
“Yes, he told me to.  And before you get yourself in a snit,” Raedan went on as Cathal opened his mouth furiously, “Aedion can take care of himself.”  
  
“Not always.”  
  
Raedan’s flare of surprise was brief then a mask settled over his face.  “Nobody can best him without poisoning him, and nobody is going to risk that this close to camp.”    
  
“I don’t care, I’m going to get him.”  He had gotten several steps away when Raedan called after him.  
  
“Cathal.”  Reluctantly he turned back.  Raedan’s expression was amused.  “I told you once to leave him be and you didn’t listen.  I’m telling you again, leave him be.  He’ll be back in a bit.”  
  
It took a few seconds for Cathal to catch up.  “Are you kidding me?  He stayed in town because he’s fucking somebody?”  Raedan nodded.  “I can’t believe he’s wasting time on his cock with all the work we have to do.”  
  
Raedan’s brows went up.  “Would you be saying that if it was your bed he was warming?”  
  
A chill ran over Cathal, followed by a flash of heat.  “Go to hell, Raedan,” he spat.  Spinning on his heel he stormed back to his tent where he threw himself down on his cot and fumed.  After a while he began to feel like an ass, and opted to pull out one of his favorite books on strategy to distract him.  It didn’t work.  
  
Aedion finally returned, looking so relaxed Cathal’s temper spiked again.  “I hope you had a nice time in town,” he said sourly.  
  
“I did, thank you,” Aedion answered after a moment’s hesitation, dropping a packet onto the table.  Cathal glared at him for a while before Aedion asked, nettled, “Is there a problem?”  
  
“No, no problem,” Cathal answered through clenched teeth.  Aedion’s mouth twitched but he waited.  “I just don’t understand how you can risk everything we’ve been working for just to exercise your cock.”  
  
“Excuse me?”  The words were polite but even Cathal couldn’t miss the shift from amused friend to predator.  He knew he should keep his mouth shut but that had never been a strong point.  
  
“You know how much work we have to do better than anyone, but you just took off without telling anyone to go fuck some random girl -”  
  
“You don’t get to do this, Cathal,” Aedion interrupted.  “You don’t get to judge me.  I have done nothing wrong, and I will not let you try to make me ashamed.”  
  
Cathal dug his fingernails into his palms and tried to make his tone reasonable.  “But Aedion, you’re a colonel now.  What you do matters, and you can’t afford to make people think you’re not fit to lead.”  
  
“Is that a rutting joke?” Aedion snarled, taking a step closer.  “Nobody gives a shit, you self-righteous bastard.”  
  
Cathal got to his feet.  “You’re the last member of the royal family.  People notice what you do.”  
  
“And why should I care?”  Aedion laughed, and Cathal flinched.  “You think Aelin is unhappy with my behavior from the next world?  You think Rhoe - who I might remind you had quite a reputation himself before he met Evalin - is disappointed?”  His voice was raw as he went on.  “There are three people in this world who give a shit about me, and none of them care if I make a woman moan for an hour.”  
  
The words were a knife in the gut.  “Everyone cares about you, Aedion,” Cathal said, mouth dry.  
  
The knife twisted.  “No.  Everyone cares about the officer, or the prince.  I’m talking about me, what I need.”  He tapped himself on the chest.  “Not what I can do for you, or for Terrasen or Adarlan.”     
  
“I care, Aedion, you know that,” Cathal snapped, stung.  “I just don’t understand how you can prioritize getting off over Terrasen.”  
  
“Go to hell, Cathal.  The day I actually prioritize anything over this country, you can talk to me.  But I’m putting my life at risk every gods-damned day, and the fact that you…”  He stopped, breathing heavily.  “You know what?  Get out.  Get out, and don’t come back until you’re willing to act less like a jealous lover.”  
  
Cathal reeled back a step, then turned and ducked through the flaps out into the brisk night.  He felt like he had been flayed open by Aedion’s lancing words, and he pressed a hand to his abdomen as if he expected to feel a wound.  Yet for the first time in three years he could feel his heart pounding in his chest, could feel the cold air through every inch of his lungs.  It was like waking up from sleep he hadn’t known he’d fallen into.  
  
When he pushed back into the tent, Aedion was still standing, head bowed, fingertips resting on the wrapped package he had brought back from town.  He looked weary and so much older  than his years when he turned his brilliant eyes on Cathal.  Before he could give himself time to think, Cathal took two strides to stop in front of Aedion.  Reaching up, he took Aedion’s face in his hands and dragged him down to meet his lips with his own.  
  
For the span of three heartbeats, Aedion did not react.  Cathal started to release him when he heard a sudden intake of breath and strong fingers twined in his hair.  Then Aedion was kissing him back and Cathal was lost to him.    
  
He had never let himself imagine this.  Never let himself think about the warmth of those lips, the smooth glide of that tongue against his, the tenderness where he expected brute strength.  He had forgotten this burning feeling, the tingling of every nerve that swamped him, drowning out time and sounds and obligations.  
  
They were both panting when they finally pulled apart, and Cathal ran his tongue over his swollen lips.  Aedion didn’t let go of him but kept his hand at the back of his head, keeping him close and dropping his forehead to rest on Cathal’s.  Pressing a palm to Aedion’s chest, Cathal could feel his heart hammering and felt a flash of satisfaction that he was not the only one so affected.  
  
“Why didn’t you ever say anything?” Aedion finally said huskily.    
  
“Because…”  Cathal cleared his throat.  “Because I know that I can’t have you, not really.”  
  
“Why not?”  
  
It was such a simple question, asked so honestly.  Cathal wanted to tell him.  Wanted to explain all the reasons the bastard-born son of the streets could never be enough for the sole remaining member of the royal family.  Wanted him to understand that the mere thought of a blade against Aedion’s skin made Cathal want to set fire to the world, but that was a liability no soldier could bear.  Wanted him to know that his nightmares were now of Aedion lying sightless under the sky.  But he couldn’t find the words.  So he shook his head and took a step back, then another, ducking out of the tent and out into the star-filled night.    
  
*****  
  
Mikkal rolled out of bed with barely a glance at the man still sprawled, sleeping, under the sheets.  He felt a twinge of guilt as he bathed and started water heating for tea.  He had to stop doing this.  No amount of mindless fucking was going to make up for Aedion being somewhere in the far north while he was stuck here teaching singing to girls with no interest in music.  
  
It had been a few weeks since Fulke had finally heard of Aedion’s safe return to his camp.  Fulke’s connection in Terrasen had not heard what had happened, only that Aedion had not found the soldiers he had been seeking, but at least he was safe.  And it had been one of Mikkal’s friends who had told him of Aedion’s promotion a couple of days later.  The drinking jag Mikkal had gone on afterwards had led to the situation he was currently in.  
  
Footsteps sounded and Darrin staggered into the kitchen, looking adorably disheveled but still half-drunk.  He muttered something unintelligible on his way through to the bathing room and Mikkal sighed as he poured eggs over the chopped tomatoes and mushrooms he’d been cooking.  It was a mystery to him how he could despise someone so much and still want to fuck him but here he was.  
  
Darrin returned just as Mikkal finished the omelet, coming over and pressing up against his back.  Mikkal grimaced a little at the smell of old liquor.  “You should take a bath and eat something,” he said, trying to sound politely concerned.  
  
“I’ll eat something,” Darrin murmured into his neck before taking Mikkal’s shoulders and spinning him around.  Undoing the front of Mikkal’s pants, Darrin reached in and stroked him until he was hard, then dropped to his knees and took him in his mouth.  Mikkal let his head fall back, closing his eyes and losing himself in the sensation, letting himself imagine he was still back at his father’s camp.  Still happy, or as happy as he ever got.  
  
Afterwards Darrin finally left and Mikkal went off to deal with more spoiled young women.  He hated the aristo families he was working for.  The singing, on the other hand, he loved.  He wondered if he could ever be good enough to forget about the teaching and just sing for a living; he’d have to talk to Fulke, who somehow seemed to know absolutely everyone in the city.  
  
That night he met Delaney at her bakery to walk her to Fulke’s.  Apparently the ruse was working well, her coworkers accepted his presence with broad smiles and unsubtle nudges.  Delaney herself seemed buoyant.  Mikkal watched her as they walked, her animated gestures and brilliant smiles, and wondered if she had found someone.  
  
Fulke had no news of importance, so Mikkal told him what little he had heard about troop movements.  Soldiers continued to head south, but apparently a significant number had been sent into the White Fangs.  That group had included a lot of other types of workers, more than regular fighters.  Otherwise there was nothing to report.  
  
After the meal, he walked Delaney back again.  He debated several times asking her if she had a lover, but bit back the question every time.  It was none of his business as long as it didn’t disrupt the charade they were playing.  Her sharp gasp as they rounded the corner and her bakery came into sight had him reaching automatically for his dagger, but then she was running, not away but towards a ragged figure standing in front of the bakery.  
  
Mikkal jogged after her, reaching her just as she swept the other girl into her arms.  “Avis, Avis.” Delaney said the name over and over, tears gushing down her cheeks.  “What are you doing here?” she asked, her voice muffled in Avis’ long hair.  
  
“I got out,” Avis said simply.  “I brought Maida with me.”  
  
Delaney looked around herself frantically.  “Where is she?”  
  
“I left her at the stable with the horse we st-, er, took,” Avis said, looking warily at Mikkal.  He smiled at her and she shifted away from him, putting Delaney between them.  Taking the hint, he backed several steps away from her and turned to watch the empty street.  There was no question this was another of Delaney’s siblings; the girl looked just like Raedan.  His heart was aching at her obvious fear and desperation, so he stood quietly and listened.  
  
*****  
  
Delaney had thought she was hallucinating when she had turned the corner and seen Avis.  But now, holding her sister in her arms and feeling her trembling, she was hoping the reality wouldn’t prove a nightmare.  She thought rapidly about where to put the girls; there was no room for them in the loft she shared above the bakery.  And Fulke had too many people coming and going at all hours.  Not letting go of Avis, she turned her head to look at Mikkal.  
  
“Can we stay with you for a few days?” she asked, trying to keep her voice steady.  
  
“Of course,” Mikkal said without hesitation, and Delaney thought again that she understood why Aedion loved him.  
  
“No,” Avis said fiercely.  “We’re not staying with him.”  
  
“Honey, it’s all right.  I don’t know where else to go.”  
  
“Not with him.  He’s a soldier.”  Delaney wondered how she knew, but a glance showed her Mikkal’s posture, the ease with which he kept his hand on his weapon.  Of course Avis knew, she’d been watching soldiers all her life.  “I’ll…I’ll rent a room or something.”  There was so much anguish in her voice that Delaney looked to Mikkal for help.  
  
“I”m not a soldier anymore.  I won’t hurt you,” he said, soothingly.  
  
Avis snorted, her disdain sharp as a knife.  “That’s what they all say.”  
  
Delaney’s stomach understood before her brain did, and she had to fight to keep her dinner.  Mikkal seemed to catch on immediately and he took his hand off his dagger and came over with his hands up in front of him.  Several steps away he stopped and crouched down so he was at eye level with Avis.  “You’re Delaney’s sister, right?”  He waited for confirmation, and eventually she nodded.  “I’m friends with Raedan and Aedion.  They trust me with Delaney, and I have never laid a hand on her.”  Avis still looked skeptical and he studied her for a moment.  With a quick glance at Delaney, he added, “If it helps, I don’t fuck women.”  
  
That did surprise Avis, and her rigid posture softened slightly.  “But…”  
  
“Aedion and I were lovers while we were stationed together.”  He flicked another glance at Delaney.  “I hope your sister doesn’t mind that I shared that.”  
  
Delaney shook her head mutely, astonished but grateful.  Avis just looked stunned, but she didn’t argue when he stood back up and gestured expansively.  “Lead the way to your sister,” he said, and Avis turned slowly and set off towards the public stables.  
  
Once there, Avis bade Delaney and Mikkal to wait outside while she entered to get Maida.  Delaney hoped they weren’t going to just disappear out another door, but Mikkal’s calm expression made it easier to breathe.  “You really don’t mind?” she asked.  
  
“Not at all.”  He tapped a finger against his dagger hilt for a moment.  “Would it be easier for your sister if I stayed elsewhere?  I’m sure I can visit a friend for a bit.”  
  
Delaney didn’t know what would be better, so she answered honestly.  “Maybe, but I’d rather you stayed if that’s all right.  I’ll feel safer having you there.”  
  
“That’s fine.  I only have the one bed, but it’ll fit the three of you.”  Before Delaney could protest, he added, “I’ll sleep on the couch.  It’s not unusual for me to do that anyway.”  She subsided, her stomach in knots so tight she didn’t have it in her to argue.  
  
Just when she was starting to panic that the girls had slipped out a different exit, Maida shot out of the door and crashed into her, wrapping her arms around her waist and sobbing.  Delaney rubbed her back, unable to believe this was her baby sister now nearly up to her shoulder.  After a few minutes Maida quieted, and she turned to survey Mikkal.  
  
“Who are you?” she hiccoughed.  
  
“My name is Mikkal,” he said with a bow.  “I’m a friend of your brother’s.  You’re going to stay with me for a little while.”  
  
Maida accepted that without comment and they all followed Mikkal through the streets.  Delaney wasn’t surprised he lived in one of the better neighborhoods; not fancy, but comfortable and safe.  He led them up two flights of stairs and let them into a clean, sparse apartment.  There was a decent-sized living area with a long couch and two chairs clustered around a fireplace, then a small kitchen, a bathing room, and a bedroom with a large bed.    
  
The girls hadn’t brought anything with them, and after conferring Delaney ran back to the bakery to grab some clothes and bread.  On her way out, she grabbed a packet of day-old cookies as well.  Her roommates were kind and understanding, and Naise, who was tiny, gave her some of her own clothes for Maida.      
  
When she got back to the apartment, she was surprised to see Maida sitting on one of the chairs in the kitchen with wet hair, wrapped in an enormous robe that must have been Mikkal’s, talking to him while he cooked.  Her lisp was gone, and somehow Delaney found herself mourning it.  Avis was in the bedroom, standing at the small window, looking at the people on the lamplit street below.  Delaney dumped her bag on the bed.  
  
“I brought you clothes, honey,” she said quietly.  Avis nodded but didn’t answer.  “Why don’t you take a bath and eat some dinner and then you can get some sleep.”    
  
Avis picked up the bag and disappeared into the bathing room.  Delaney rubbed her hand over her face, fighting for control.  She didn’t know how she had managed to fail the girls so badly, but the agony of knowing she had abandoned them - had left Avis to the nonexistent mercies of the officers - almost brought her to her knees.  It was as bad as watching Malins and Aedion.  Worse, even.  Aedion was a soldier; he was trained to break men, to kill them.  Avis had been soft and sweet and gentle.  It was going to kill Delaney that this frozen hardness was all her fault.  
  
After a while there was a quiet knock and Mikkal entered.  “The girls are eating,” he said, perching on the foot of the bed.  Delaney nodded but didn’t trust herself to speak.  After a moment he stood and went to the door, but he turned back before leaving.  “They’re here, Delaney.  They’re safe now.  You gave them a place to come to.  Whatever those monsters did…that’s not your fault.”  When she didn’t respond he slipped out and closed the door behind him.  
  
She wondered idly how he knew what was eating her alive, but her exhaustion overwhelmed her.  The bathing room was empty save for the bag of clothes she’d brought, a stack of towels, and steam.  After quickly washing her face, she unbraided her hair and pulled on her nightclothes, then returned to the bedroom and crawled under the covers.  She lay there, her mind a swirling fog, unable to form a coherent thought, unable to sleep.  Only once her sisters joined her and she had Maida wrapped tightly in her arms was she able to quiet the maelstrom in her mind and sink into the peaceful dark.    
  
*****  
  
Cathal hadn’t come back to the tent after his unexpected kiss, and Aedion didn’t know where he had slept.  Not that he had gotten much sleep himself; the whole situation had confused the hell out of him.  Yet he found himself scanning the mess hall for Cathal and struggling to keep the grin off his face when he spotted him at the end of one long table.  He looked rumpled, like he’d slept under a bush somewhere, and the stretch of empty chairs around him indicated he must have been in some temper.  Aedion dropped into the seat next to him and ignored the small jump he gave.  
  
“Did you get any sleep?” Aedion asked, not bothering to lower his voice.  
  
Cathal’s mouth tightened, but he answered.  “A couple hours in the barracks.”  Aedion raised an eyebrow but didn’t comment.  “I wanted to talk to you yesterday, but you were gone, and then…”  A dull flush crept up his neck and Aedion bit the inside of his cheek to keep a straight face.  
  
“And then we learned that you’re a jealous bastard,” he said lightly.  “What did you want to talk to me about?”  
  
“I think I should be the one to go scout for the others.”  Cathal watched for a reaction and, getting none, went on.  “I know the area, I’m a good shot, and I know ghost leopard habits.  If it really is Millar, well, Major Ward was under him, that might buy me some recognition.”  
  
Aedion nodded, chewing thoughtfully.  “Do you think he’ll react as well as Dewar did when you punch him in the face, or can I expect some sort of retribution?”  Cathal huffed, and Aedion went on.  “Really, you could have just asked.  You didn’t need to seduce me first.”  
  
“Aedion…”  
  
“Though I can’t deny your methods are effective.  Do you know if Millar has the same weaknesses I do?”  
  
“Aedion.”  There was a warning in his tone that Aedion chose to ignore.  
  
“Really, I don’t know why you didn’t try this sooner.  You know I’m a slave to my cock, you would’ve been able to get whatever you wanted.”  He was expecting the punch Cathal threw next, and caught it in his hand.  The force behind it was impressive but he kept his face impassive.    
  
“You’re a bastard, Aedion,” Cathal snarled.  
  
“I know, I know.”  Shifting his grip to Cathal’s wrist, he stood and began walking towards the exit, ignoring Cathal’s yelp as he got dragged along.  He was well aware of everybody’s eyes on the two of them but pretended he couldn’t see them as he shoved Cathal through the door in front of him.  A second shove once they reached the grass had Cathal stumbling away from him.  Once he caught his balance, he tugged at his clothing to straighten it before facing Aedion with crossed arms.  
  
“What the hell is wrong with you?” Cathal demanded, oblivious to the fact that a crowd was gathering.  
  
“Half a dozen sentences and you were ready to to start a fight.  Damnit, Cathal, you make a rabid wolf look like a master of self control.”  There was a smattering of laughter that went abruptly silent at a look from Aedion.  
  
All the fight had dropped out of Cathal, and Aedion walked over with a grin and draped an arm across his shoulders.  “Come on.”  He led him around to where the house was being built.  He hadn’t been by there for at least a week, and it was nice to see it had a roof and walls now.  Hammering was echoing from inside, and he wondered briefly what it was like building something for a living.    
  
“I can’t believe all that bullshit was a test,” Cathal said when they stopped in front of the house.  Aedion expected him to step out from under his arm, but he didn’t.  
  
“Only partly.”  Aedion shot him a grin.  “I also know you have avoiding people down to an art form.”  Cathal huffed a grudging laugh.  “I mean, I still haven’t seen you say two words to Gillies.  Actually,” Aedion went on, “I should take lessons from you.  I mean, I think I went a month once without speaking to Raedan, but you see how well that lasted.”  
  
Now Cathal did pull out from under his arm, but only to stare at him in shock.  “You’re kidding!”  Aedion shook his head, his smile fading.  “Why?”  
  
“He ripped into me about Mikkal.”  
  
Cathal’s brow furrowed.  “I thought he liked Mikkal.”  
  
“He does now, but at the time…”  Aedion had to think for a moment.  “Let’s just say he didn’t understand why I would get involved with him.”  
  
“Huh.  I didn’t think he’d have that sort of prejudice.”  
  
Aedion shrugged and walked up the rough steps to peer in through the doorway of the building.  There were actual walls up on the inside too, and he could see how it was shaping out.  Turning back, he hopped down to the ground and walked to where Cathal was still standing, watching him.  “It’s looking good,” Aedion said, gesturing over his shoulder.  They started walking towards the meeting room where the other officers would be heading once breakfast was over.  “And no, Raedan’s not prejudiced like that.”  
  
“Then why did he get so upset?”    
  
Aedion glanced over at the people filtering out of the mess hall.  “It’s a long story, but I’ll explain sometime, I’m sure.”  
  
“I could always ask Raedan,” Cathal threatened, teasingly.  
  
Aedion laughed, but even he could hear the grim note.  “You won’t get that story out of him, believe me.  Now, let’s go convince everyone you’re not going to kill the mysterious Colonel Millar for looking at you wrong.”  
  
With a rude gesture, Cathal preceded him into the room.  
  
*****  
  
Delaney woke from dreams she couldn’t remember with tears in her eyes.  Maida was still sound asleep next to her, but Avis was nowhere to be seen in the gray light filtering through the windows.  She could hear subtle sounds of movement in the other room.  Slipping out of bed she crept to the door on silent feet, listened for a moment then eased the door open.  
  
Mikkal was asleep on the couch still, his long legs curled so they wouldn’t hang off.  Delaney sat in one of the chairs and waited.  A couple of minutes later, Avis tiptoed into the room, looking over her shoulder at the closed bedroom door.  She was dressed to go out in Delaney’s clothes and her own ratty coat, clutching a small purse that Delaney had not seen the day before.  
  
Avis turned to navigate the furniture to the door and jerked to a stop when she saw Delaney.  All color drained from her face, and surprise and fear flickered across it before her lips tightened into a bloodless line.    
  
“Where are you going?” Delaney whispered, not wanting to wake Mikkal.  His eyes fluttered open and he glanced at her, then closed them again with barely a hitch in his breathing.    
  
“Nowhere,” Avis whispered back, drawing herself up.  Delaney just looked her up and down and waited, arms crossed.  “It’s none of your business.”  
  
“Avis, I’m your sister, I want to help you, just tell me what you need.”  
  
The look Avis gave her was scathing.  “You’ve only ever run and hid, Delaney.  You don’t know how to help anyone but yourself.”  
  
The words pelted into her like stones, and Delaney caught her breath at the sting of it.  “I wrote to you, almost a year ago.  I wanted you to come here, to get out of there.  Why didn’t you come?”  
  
Avis looked away.  “I have to go.”  
  
“Are you coming back?”  
  
With a glance at Mikkal’s still form, Avis asked, “Were he and Aedion really…?”    
  
Delaney nodded and waited, watching her sister’s bitter mask for any sign of the girl she had raised.  Avis chewed on her lip for a moment.  “I’ll be back.”  Her eyes met Delaney’s, cold and hard.  “I can’t trust you to keep Maida safe.”  
  
Stuffing her purse into the pocket of her coat, she crossed the carpet and let herself out.  Delaney was left, heart bleeding, trying to figure out how a conversation that was so quiet could wound so much more deeply than any shouted curse.  
  
As soon as Avis’ footsteps had passed hearing range, Mikkal sat up and looked at Delaney, face tight with concern.  “Are you all right?”  Delaney shook her head, unable to speak.  He crossed to her and put a cautious arm around her.  His solid warmth enveloped her, and after a moment she relaxed into it.  She took one deep breath, then another.  Just as she thought she was under control, she remembered the fury in her sister’s eyes and she was lost.  
  
Her racking sobs overwhelmed her, and for long minutes all she could feel was her body shaking apart with the force of her weeping.  Eventually she registered a strong arm still banding around her ribs, a firm hand rubbing soft circles into her back, a deep voice murmuring reassurances.  
  
When she finally quieted, he held her for a long time, resting his cheek on her head.  “You know,” he said, and she could feel his voice rumbling through her chest, “Raedan wrote to them as well.  Your sisters.  He asked them to come to my father’s camp.”  
  
She wasn’t sure why he was telling her this.  “How do you know?”  
  
“He asked me first.  It would’ve been about a year ago now,” he said thoughtfully.  “It was right before I left.  I was visiting him in the infirmary.  I checked with my father, he said it was fine…”  He trailed off.  
  
Delaney didn’t want to talk, she wanted to go after Avis and make up for abandoning her.  She wanted to go back in time and take her family with her when she fled.  She wanted to tear Pennington’s camp and every soldier in it apart with her bare hands.  But since none of those were an option, she just asked, “So?”  
  
He jolted, and she wondered where his thoughts had gone.  “So why didn’t they go?  Aedion was able to pay for the transport.  If things were that bad, why wouldn’t they go to Raedan, or to you?”  
  
She moved to stand up and he let his arm drop, watching her as she walked into the kitchen.  She wasn’t hungry, felt like she was going to vomit, but she started mechanically making breakfast anyway, as she needed to leave soon to get to the bakery.  The entire idea of going to work was probably ludicrous but she didn’t know what else to do.  
  
Mikkal silently joined her and helped, and soon the bedroom door opened and a tousled Maida emerged, sniffing hopefully at the smell of frying bacon.  Delaney did her best to smile at her, and Maida padded over and hugged her around her middle.  Mikkal ruffled Maida’s hair as he passed by with the teakettle, and she rewarded him with an open grin.    
  
After a breakfast she didn’t remember eating, Delaney numbly hurried through the rest of her morning ritual.  A glance at Mikkal’s clock showed that she was running late, and she hoped her roommates would make her excuses to Luk.  The last thing she needed was to lose this job…  
  
When she rushed back out to the living area, Maida was sitting primly on a chair with her shoes and shabby jacket on.  “I’m coming too,” she announced as soon as she saw Delaney, who exchanged quick looks with Mikkal.  It was actually the best option, as he had to work in a couple of hours, but she didn’t know what to do about Avis.  
  
“I’ll leave a note for her if she doesn’t return,” Mikkal said, reading her mind.    
  
“Avis’ll be back soon,” Maida said confidently, and Delaney studied her intently for a moment.  Maida had not asked about her sister’s absence, had not seemed surprised or concerned.  Sighing, she put her shoes on.  Mikkal handed her a key as she straightened, and she stared at it in surprise.    
  
“I’ll have more copies made,” he said, and she nodded her thanks.    
  
It was a silent walk to the bakery.  Delaney wanted to ask a million questions, but Maida was distracted by all the people and the bustle.  When they reached Luk’s - just a minute late - he welcomed Maida without question and she was warmly accepted in among the bakers.  Soon she was running around fetching flour or eggs or cinnamon while Delaney set to work on her cookies.  
  
A couple of hours passed before Avis appeared, ushered back into the kitchen by Naise.  After washing up carefully, she joined in the fray, quickly settling in at the sink washing equipment.  They morning went by in a flurry of activity.  When it was time for her break, Delaney asked her sisters whether they wanted to join her in the square or remain at the bakery, and both chose the latter.  it may have had something to do with the chocolate-filled pastries that Pamela had shoved into their hands a few minutes earlier, but Delaney was grateful.  She wanted to tell Cherise about her situation without the girls there.  
  
The painful knot in her chest eased a little the second she saw Cherise.  Outwardly, their relationship hadn’t changed despite their stolen hours spent in shadowed corners and doorways.  But they both felt the shift.  
  
Cherise’s face was uncharacteristically serious as Delaney explained about her sisters.  “Let me help,” she said immediately.    
  
Delaney wanted to kiss her for that.  “Thank you.  I’m not sure what we need though, honestly.”  
  
Cherise smiled, but there was a little exasperation behind it.  “Money?  Clothes?  A place to stay?  Maybe a job for Avis?”  
  
“I can manage the first three…”  
  
“By staying with Major Paget,” Cherise snorted.  “I’m sure he’s a very nice man, but it doesn’t sound like your sisters are so happy with that, and I can’t imagine a man like that enjoys having three girls invade his apartment.”  
  
“Ugh, you’re right,” Delaney said after a moment, pinching the bridge of her nose to try to ward off the impending headache.    
  
“When do you get out of work?” Cherise asked.    
  
“In three hours.”    
  
Cherise nodded and they finished their meal in rare silence.  
  
Somehow, Delaney was not surprised when Cherise met them at the bakery at the end of her shift.  The girls appraised the stranger and evidently found in her favor, as even Avis was willing to talk a little while they walked.  Cherise steered them towards the handful of stores that were open later, and then refused to let Delaney pay for the outfits and nightclothes they selected.  She then accompanied them back to Mikkal’s apartment.  
  
He was there with a meal ready, and he greeted them with some relief when he saw Avis with them.  With his usual courtesy he invited Cherise to stay and eat, but she bowed out with slightly mocking politeness.  Avis ate quietly and retreated to the bedroom immediately, and Delaney followed her in, ignoring the way Avis kept her back to her.  
  
“I need you to talk to me,” Delaney said.  Avis acted as if she hadn’t heard her.  “I need to know why you ignored not just my invitation to come here, but Raedan’s to join him and Aedion.”  Avis whipped around, mouth open whether in shock or to protest, Delaney didn’t know.  But as she met Delaney’s eyes her face crumpled and she started to weep.  
  
Gathering her sister in her arms, Delaney sat on the foot of the bed and rocked her, her own tears falling lightly onto Avis’s hair.  When Avis finally quieted with some hiccoughing breaths, Delaney waited for her to begin speaking.  Instead, her breathing smoothed out and she fell asleep, curled in Delaney’s lap.  Sighing, Delaney kept her arms caged around her, not sure what nightmares she might need to ward off but ready to fight.  
  
*****  
  
Cathal woke in the dark, gathering his pack as silently as he could.  He was leaving at first light, heading west with three of the regulars from that region.  He didn’t want to wake Aedion, not when he had enough trouble sleeping at the best of times, and when they still hadn’t really done anything about what had happened the other night.  
  
The creak of the cot as he reached the opening of the tent had him turning, and he almost crashed into Aedion who was somehow immediately behind him.  He cursed, and there was a flash of teeth in the dim light as Aedion grinned.  “I know you weren’t going to leave without saying goodbye to the tent,” he said in a voice still rough from sleep.  
  
“To the…to the tent?” Cathal asked in confusion.  
  
“Well, by the time you get back the house will be finished.”  
  
That hadn’t occurred to Cathal, and for some reason it bothered him.  After all, they had been sharing sleeping quarters for the majority of the time since they left Orynth.  He glanced up at the canvas overhead.  “I guess I should move the stuff I’m not bringing to the barracks, then.”  
  
Aedion made a noise, amusement or irritation Cathal couldn’t tell without being able to see his face clearly.  “What?” Cathal asked.  
  
In response, Aedion cupped Cathal’s jaw in his hands and took his mouth with his own.  Somehow this kiss was different.  With Muire and Luthais, he had always felt like he was the one holding on.  This was an equal give and take, a question and an answer.  It was possessing and being possessed; it was the water that raises the boat and the rope that anchors it.  Though in reality it lasted mere seconds it seemed to open a gate to eternity.    
  
“Fuck,” was all Cathal could come up with when Aedion pulled away.  
  
“Fine with me,” Aedion replied, and that was definitely humor in his voice, “but I think the others might come looking for you.”  
  
“Damnit, Aedion.”  Cathal tried to steady his breathing.  “What…why now?”  
  
“Consider it incentive to come back.”  
  
“Duly noted.”  Cathal stumbled over his own feet as he moved to leave, cursing the sudden loss of blood to his brain.    
  
“Oh, and Cathal?” Aedion called from behind him.  “If you’re not back in a month I’m going looking for you myself.  Remember that.”  
  
Cathal nodded, barely resisting flipping him off as he staggered as if drunk towards the stables.  Twenty minutes later he and the others were saddled and ready, and as he rode Chance through the gates and turned away from the dawning sun all he could think of was the feel of rough stubble on his face and a nearly overwhelming surge of homesickness.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> All comments and feedback are really appreciated!


	20. Chapter 20

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There is a little allusion to the incident in Chapter 5 here. Also a discussion of a woman's right to choose. Nothing graphic, but just wanted to give y'all a heads-up.

It was the cramp in her lower back that woke Delaney up, and she had a moment of panic when she couldn’t feel her left leg.  Bolting upright in the dark room, she realized Avis had fallen asleep on it, and she felt her heartbeat slow as the terror receded.  Gently, she slid a hand under her sister’s head and slipped out from underneath her, shoving a pillow under her cheek before limping awkwardly out of the bedroom.  
  
Maida was asleep on the couch, and she shook her head at Mikkal sprawled uncomfortably in one of the chairs.  By the time she had returned from the bathing room, he was blinking blearily at her, and she sat down in the adjacent seat.  
  
“You’re ridiculous,” she said quietly.    
  
He shrugged and rubbed his face.  “She was comfortable.”  
  
Shaking her head, Delaney carefully lifted Maida off the couch.  Her baby sister stirred but only to snuggle in closer as she carried her into the bedroom and set her down next to Avis.  Then she pulled a blanket over the pair of them before joining them.  She was too awake despite the silence that had settled over the city, and she watched her sisters’ peaceful faces and listened to their steady breathing until finally she was able to close her eyes and join them.  
  
When the bed shifted, Delaney was awake and on her feet before Avis could finish untangling herself from the blanket.  Maida also stirred, looking briefly startled by her change in location.  Avis gave them both a searching look before heading towards the door but Delaney blocked her exit.  “No,” Delaney said firmly.  “You don’t leave until you tell me what is going on.”  
  
Avis crossed her arms and flayed her with a look.  “I’m not sure why you care all of a sudden.”  
  
“I always cared,” Delaney snapped, done with Avis’s attitude, done with the guilt.  “I wrote you, I wanted to get you out a year ago.  Raedan tried to get you out too.  So don’t give me that bullshit, and let me help you.”  
  
“You can’t help me,” Avis said, and Delaney could hear the defeat behind the anger in her voice.  
  
“How do you know that?”  
  
Avis glanced at Maida, who looked back at her steadily.  With a gesture from Avis, Maida wrapped the blanket around herself and headed for the door.  Delaney let her past with a quick squeeze to her shoulder.  When Delaney faced her again, Avis squared her shoulders and raised her chin.  “I’m pregnant,” she said scathingly.    
  
If it weren’t for the door behind her, Delaney would have fallen.  A buzzing rose in her ears and there were spots in front of her eyes before she blinked them away.  She took one gasping breath, then another.  On the third, her head cleared, and with the fourth, she asked, “How?”  
  
The look Avis gave her could have flayed flesh from bone.  
  
“No, that’s…I guess I meant who?”  
  
After a long pause, Avis answered reluctantly, “You don’t know him.”  Delaney waited for a long moment for her to elaborate.  
  
When nothing further was forthcoming, Delaney decided to cut to the heart of it.  “Do you want to keep it?”  
  
Avis gaped at her.  “What?”  
  
Delaney had thought she’d been clear.  “You don’t have to if you don’t want to,” she said.  Avis’s face had gone completely blank, and Delaney rushed to put a hand on her arm.  “I will help you, I promise.”  
  
“I…I don’t understand,” Avis finally choked out.    
  
“Have you seen a healer?”  Avis nodded confirmation.  “And they didn’t…”  Delaney blew out a frustrated breath.  “There are herbs and medicines they can give you if you’re not too far along to force a miscarriage.  If that’s what you want.”  She still couldn’t read Avis’s face.  “If you want to keep it, honey, I will help you in any way I can.  It will be all right.”  
  
Avis moved suddenly, grabbing Delaney’s arms with a bruising grip.  “You’re telling me the truth?  If you’re giving me false hope…”  
  
Delaney shook her head.  “I think it does depend on how far along you are, so we should take you to a healer and find out as soon as possible.”  
  
“Today?”  
  
“Today.”  
  
It was hours later when they staggered back into the empty apartment, exhausted, with Cherise solemn at their heels.  She had accompanied them as they sought out the healer that Ophelie from the bakery had used, and it had been Cherise, not Delaney, who had handed the healer the necessary coins.  The healer had been kind and thorough and explained all the potential risks before handing over the small bottle.  Avis had taken it from the woman with a shaking hand, and stared at it for nearly a minute before tucking it into her small bag.  
  
Avis pulled it out now and set it on the table in the living area.  Maida squeezed into the chair next to her, wrapping her thin arms around her.  Delaney didn’t know how much of this Maida understood but suspected too much.  All four of them stared at it as if they expected it to explode.    
  
“What are you going to do?” Delaney finally asked.    
  
“I don’t know,” Avis whispered.    
  
When the light began to dim through the windows, Cherise stood up to light one of the lamps.  The movement was enough to break the silent vigil, and suddenly they were all on their feet discussing what to do for dinner.  Mikkal came in then and they crowded into the kitchen to cook.  Cherise set Maida laughing, leaping back from the chicken sizzling in the pan as if she were afraid of it and adding seasoning with exaggerated movements.  Only the fact that everyone’s eyes kept straying to the unremarkable amber bottle in unguarded moments gave any indication that Avis’ choice was sitting quietly in their midst.  
  
*****  
  
The collection of buildings was a surprise as they made their way down the mountain.  Then again, each little village was unexpected out here.  There were no maps that marked anything but the largest towns, so places like this were generally known only to locals and merchants.  
  
Cathal scanned the buildings for a blacksmith.  Blair’s horse had been dealing with a loose shoe for the past mile or so, and if they didn’t get it fixed he’d be lamed.  He spotted a small house with an adjacent building with a forge, though there was no one in sight.  They reined in their horses and dismounted to wait.  
  
A few minutes later a young man, somewhere between Aedion’s and Cathal’s ages, popped out of the house.  Taking in the four soldiers in front of him, he bowed awkwardly.  “May I help you?” he asked, in a more muted accent than was typical of this region.  
  
Blair explained the problem, and the young man took a careful look at the horse then grabbed his tools and pulled the shoe.  It was bent and one of the clips had sprung, necessitating replacement rather than just resetting.  As he was stoking up the forge, a wizened old man hobbled out.  
  
“Get away from that horse, boy,” the old man snapped, “before you lame him for good.”  He turned to Cathal and bowed deeply.  “My apologies, sir, the boy’s not ready to shoe horses yet.  I’ll take care of you.”  With efficient movements, he trimmed the foot and began fitting a shoe under Blair’s watchful eye.  Cathal, on the other hand, couldn’t help but watch the young man, who was red-faced to the roots of his mousy hair as he handed his mentor tools on demand.  
  
After a few minutes, Cathal wandered into the building that housed the forge, casually examining the rows of farming equipment and horse shoes.  In the far back corner, gleaming even in the dim light, were weapons.  Fighting and throwing knives and stilettos, to be precise.  He hefted a dagger and twirled it through his fingers, admiring the perfect balance of it.  The hilt was not ornate but it sat comfortably in the hand.  He tested the edge carefully with his thumb and studied the blood that welled with the slightest pressure.  
  
These knives were far finer than his own, than any he had seen in the armory at camp.  He looked back in the direction of the forge to see the younger man’s eyes on him, expression wary.  Beneath the caution, Cathal thought he could detect a note of pride.    
  
He continued his lap of the shed to the music of hammering as the blacksmith shaped the shoe.   Hay was talking to the old man when speech was possible, leading the conversation skillfully to find out if he knew any rumors of a gathering of soldiers.  Cathal left him to it, having learned that the garrulous soldier was their best bet at getting information without raising suspicion.  Instead, he stopped next to the younger man.  
  
“Those are some fine weapons your master makes,” he said, watching the man’s reaction, catching the slight flicker in his cheek, the hard swallow, the brief tightening of his hands.    
  
“Yes, sir, thank you, sir,” the man replied, looking away.    
  
His suspicions confirmed, Cathal turned his attention back to the old man where he was applying the shoe with efficient strokes of the hammer.  Once finished, Blair jogged the horse up and down the street for a moment before the blacksmith declared himself satisfied.  Cathal paid him and he disappeared back into the house, while the younger man began sweeping up.  
  
“We’re looking for a weapons-maker,” Cathal said abruptly.  There was a brief pause in the sweeping before it resumed with vigor.  “We could use you.”  
  
“You mean my master,” the man said quietly.  
  
Cathal cocked his head.  “No, I’m pretty sure I mean you.  You’re the one who made those knives after all.”  
  
There was tension in the young man’s shoulders as he attacked the hoof trimmings with unnecessary violence.  “I’m apprenticed, sir.”  
  
“If you weren’t, would you come with us?”  Cathal held his breath while he waited, and at the slight nod went and knocked on the door.  
  
Half an hour and a dozen gold pieces later, a bemused Conor Shaw was following them on a bony nag as Hay relayed what he’d heard from the blacksmith.  They turned north as soon as the path allowed, Kemp cursing under his breath.  Evidently a village on the western edge of the Allsbrook lands had been taken over by soldiers after the surrender.  It was not twenty miles to the north, practically in Kemp’s family’s backyard.    
  
It was early afternoon the next day when Cathal, Kemp, and Hay wound their way into a shallow valley and the pines on either side of them began to clear.  They had left Blair and Shaw to camp back at the previous fork, on the off chance of a problem.  As they passed a few houses and headed towards a square, men began stepping out into the rocky road behind them.  All were armed and moved with a practiced aggression Cathal recognized, but he ignored them for now.  He knew he was safe from these men, having the advantage of being on horseback.  Chance hated having his bridle grabbed; should someone try to stop him they would get a hoof in their face in a hurry.  It was why he had kept the horse all these years; it was how he had survived the last battle with Adarlan when Luthias had not.  
  
They stopped in the square, Kemp on his left hip and Hay on his right, and waited.  There was a chill in the air that had nothing to do with the gray sky overhead signaling an early winter, and his instinctive tension was proved justified as they were surrounded by several hundred men.  When a grizzled man, graying at the temples, stepped up in front of him he recognized Colonel Millar.  
  
Cathal had never been close enough to Millar to look him in the eye until now, had only seen him from afar at the head of a company of soldiers.  Millar held himself with calm certainty as he stopped a couple of yards shy of the three visitors, one hand resting on his ornate sword hilt.  He had fought under Orlon himself in decades past, and though age had no doubt slowed him some it had not robbed him of any of his strength of will.  The steel in his eyes rivaled Darrow’s and set Cathal’s teeth on edge.  He tightened his grip on his reins, earning a head toss from his horse.    
  
The silence stretched between them, broken only by the jingling as Kemp’s horse chewed his bit and the slight rustling of the men around them.  Finally, Cathal decided to break it.  “I am Captain Cathal Rosach,” he said, as respectfully as he could muster, “and this is Allyn Hay and Tristian Kemp.”  They all three bowed as best they could on horseback.  Aedion had warned him to keep it respectful, to seek a joining, not a takeover.   
  
“Cathal Rosach,” Millar said thoughtfully.  “I think I remember that name.”  
  
“I served you under Major Ward, sir,” Cathal clarified.  
  
“Ah, yes, I remember now.  I heard you had gone insane.”  
  
Cathal could feel Kemp’s and Hay’s eyes flick to him and he bit the inside of his cheek before replying, “And I had heard you were dead, sir.  I’m certain you know not to believe everything you hear.”  
  
Millar laughed as his men shifted uneasily.  “Well, what brings you to me, then, Captain?”  The sneer on the last word had Kemp stiffening to his left.  “Have you come to join?”  
  
“In a way, sir,” Cathal said with strained politeness.  “You may have heard that Prince Aedion Ashryver has returned to Terrasen.”  Millar nodded, but all amusement had left his face at Aedion’s name.  “He is gathering the Bane, and we are interested in joining with you to increase the strength of our forces.”  
  
“Ashryver, the Bastard Prince,” Millar said, his voice dripping with scorn.  “Ashryver, who is a pawn of Adarlan, is he not?”  
  
Hay spoke up in his affable way.  “He is an officer of Adarlan but not a pawn, sir.”  
  
Millar snorted.  “So you three have bought what he’s selling, eh?  I’m disappointed some of my former soldiers could be so gullible.”  He was staring at Cathal as he said it.  Cathal stared back as impassively as he could manage.  
  
“Perhaps if you met with him, sir, you would understand,” Cathal said.  Chance tossed his head again and Cathal forced himself to soften his fingers.  
  
“Meet with him.  You want me to meet with a seventeen year old brat who according to reports has killed his own men in a fit of temper?  He’s not a leader, Rosach, he just fancies himself such because Rhoe Galathynius pumped him full of his own importance for a decade.  And I’m surprised, after what I heard happened to you, that you’d turn yourself over to him so easily.”  
  
“Sir, I don’t know what rumors you’re referring to,” Kemp said before Cathal could respond, “but I’ve been with Colonel Ashryver for five months now, sir.  I can assure you, he is indeed a man worth following.”    
  
This.  This was why he’d wanted Kemp, a serious-minded veteran, along with him.  Cathal gave Kemp a slight nod before adding, “We’re not asking you to commit to anything, sir.  But Ashryver has an idea for how to keep Terrasen losses from continuing, and we would love if you would meet with him to hear him out.”  
  
Millar closed the distance between them, and Cathal angled Chance away, just in case. “I can assure you all that you have come a long way for nothing,” the colonel spat.  “I won’t surrender my men to Adarlan.  I won’t discuss anything of the kind with your precious prince.  If he wishes to surrender to me, return with that message - and I mean you, Rosach - and then we can have a conversation.  Otherwise, if he comes here, it will be seen as an act of war.  Now get out.  If you are not out of this valley in thirty minutes, we will kill you and see what Ashryver makes of that.”  
  
“Yes, sir.  Thank you for your time, sir,” Cathal ground out, the words bitter on his tongue.  He carefully reined Chance around, followed by Hay and Kemp, and the three of them jogged out of the valley the way they had entered it.  
  
*****  
  
Mikkal awoke to the sound of furtive footsteps, followed by the soft scrape of glass on wood, the light rustle of fabric, the quiet creak of a chair.  Opening his eyes he could see one of the girls settling in, wrapped in a blanket.  It was too dark to see her face, but the figure was too tall to be Maida, too slight to be Delaney.  Avis then.  
  
There was just enough light from the moon outside the window to earn a faint glimmer off the bottle she was holding.  Not wanting to startle her or spy on her, he stretched to catch her attention.  She stiffened and her head shot up, her eyes gleaming catlike in the dark.  When she realized he was looking at her she started to rise but he put a hand up.  “No, no, it’s all right, you can stay there.”  
  
Over the past few days Avis had gone from pretending Mikkal was invisible to beginning to talk to him here and there during general conversation.  Nevertheless he was surprised when she asked, in a voice so remote she might almost have been talking to herself, “Have you ever gotten a girl pregnant?”  
  
He knew, of course; Delaney had told him about Avis’s situation, about her impending decision.  “No,” he answered.  “I told you when we met that I prefer men.”  
  
“Have you ever bedded a woman?”   
  
“A few times.”  He didn’t know why she was asking, but he had nothing to hide.  
  
“Did you tell her you loved her?”  
  
“No.  No, it was never about love with them, not for either of us.”  
  
She snorted, sounding so much older than her age.  “That doesn’t mean you didn’t tell her that.”  
  
He sat up then, keeping the blanket wrapped around him.  “Honestly, I never cared enough to lie.”  
  
“Then why did you bed them?”  
  
Mikkal had to think about how to answer that.  “I…I wanted to see if I liked it.  If I could like it, I guess.”  
  
He still couldn’t see her face, but she was leaning forward and he could feel her eyes pinned on him.  “You said…”  She paused for a long moment.  “Were…were you in love with Aedion?”  
  
“Yes,” he said, unhesitating.    
  
“Then why?”  She must have felt his quizzical look, or perhaps the light showed enough of his face.  “Why did you want to see if you liked women?”  
  
“Oh.  Oh, that was before I met Aedion.  I guess part of me wished I could like women.”  
  
“I don’t understand.”  
  
No, he didn’t expect her to.  Gods, she was so young, too young for this conversation.  Too young to be sitting in that chair with an embryo in her womb and that tonic in her hands.  He rubbed his mutilated hand over his face.  He wanted to strangle the man responsible for this.  “My mother…I suppose no parent wants to know their child will never raise a child of their own.  She was always trying to introduce me to women.  I hated to disappoint her.”  
  
Another cynical snort sounded from the chair.  “My mother never gave a damn.  I’m not sure she’s even realized we’re gone.”    
  
Mikkal shoved down another surge of useless anger.  “Want some tea?” he asked, standing.  She got up and followed him into the kitchen while he lit a lamp and started some water heating.  He pulled out his chamomile-lavender mix and spooned some into his teapot.  Once the water was ready he filled the pot, pulling down mugs while it steeped.  Avis sat on one of the stools in silence, not watching him, just staring at nothing.  He poured the tea and leaned against the counter as Avis wrapped her hands tightly around her mug.  
  
“Do you want to be a mother?” he finally asked gently.    
  
She started as if she’d forgotten he was there.  “I don’t know.  I’m not… I don’t want to be like my mother, you know?  I don’t want to resent a child the way she does with us.”  
  
Mikkal nodded, unsure of how to respond.  After sipping his tea for a moment, he asked, “Then why not take it?”  He gestured with his mug at the bottle now sitting next to her on the counter.  
  
She picked it up and studied it again.  “He said…he told me he loved me.  He said I’d be an officer’s wife someday, his wife.”  She looked up at Mikkal, such anguish in her eyes.  “That’s why I agreed, you see.  I wasn’t really ready, the other girls had told me it hurt and that it… changed things, and I wasn’t ready for that.  But he said he loved me, and that if I loved him back I’d do it.”  There were tears rolling down her face now, but she made no move to wipe them away.   “So it doesn’t seem right.”  
  
A lot of things didn’t seem right to Mikkal, so he had to ask what she meant.  
  
“Getting rid of the only thing he ever gave me.”  
  
The buzzing in his ears in response to that was so loud he didn’t hear what she said next.  She repeated it hesitantly.  “Was your mother upset?”  
  
After taking several large mental steps backwards, he understood.  “Only that Aedion and I were going to be separated,” he said, laughing a little at the memory, at himself, at his stupidity.  “She only wants me to be happy.”  
  
Avis didn’t say anything as she finished her tea, then got off her stool and went back to the bedroom.  Mikkal returned to his couch, but not to sleep.  The subtle ticking of the clock was loud in his ears as he lay and stared at the ceiling, watching the moonlight shift as the night drifted into morning.  
  
He was making breakfast as the girls prepared for their day when he noticed the little amber bottle was gone.   
  
*****  
  
Marcra shifted under Aedion as Kelso came at him, sword swinging.  The horse had obviously never been fought off of, and only Aedion’s iron leg against his side kept him from shying sideways.  He pinned his ears but stood firm as Aedion blocked the blow and shoved back with force.  Kelso’s blade dropped and he cursed, while Aedion gave Marcra’s neck a good scratch as a reward.  
  
“He’s getting better, eh?” Gillies commented as he rode over.  “He might never be as aggressive as your mare was but two weeks ago you couldn’t even draw a sword on him.”  
  
Aedion grinned.  He couldn’t help but be pleased with the gelding’s progress.  “He’s coming along for sure.”  They began another drill, asking Marcra to spin on his haunches so Aedion could attack on either side. As he turned to the left, he saw movement in the distance.  Horsemen.   
  
Calling a halt to the session, Aedion sheathed his sword and sent Marcra into a canter towards the newcomers.  Kelso was right behind him, Gillies a few strides back.  As they neared, Aedion felt a smile spreading across his face when he recognized Cathal’s horse at the front.  
  
“You’re back early, you lazy bums,” he called, even as he took in the unfamiliar young man at the back and the grim expressions on his men’s faces.  Once they got close enough for Gillies to identify them, he peeled off back towards the camp.  Kelso remained, though Aedion wasn’t sure why.  
  
Aedion fell in next to Cathal, glancing over his shoulder to the stranger at the back of the group.  “You brought me a gift?” he asked, raising his eyebrows as he gestured.  
  
Cathal’s lips twitched up, almost against his will.  “I did,” he said, pulling a dagger and flipping it over to him.  Aedion caught it easily and examined it, giving a low whistle at the quality, the perfect balance.  “Not just the dagger, but the man who made it.”  
  
“You’re kidding.”  Aedion twisted in his saddle to better study the man.  He looked utterly exhausted, utterly ordinary, and so young.  Aedion wondered briefly if he looked this young to other people.  He turned Marcra around and waited until the man and his underfed horse reached him.  
  
“Welcome,” he said, nodding at the stranger.    
  
The man quickly averted his eyes and ducked his head.  “Thank you, sir,” he said hoarsely.  
  
“This is a beautiful weapon,” Aedion said, holding up the dagger by the blade.  “Where did you learn to make them?”  
  
The man gulped, his face the color of whey, before replying, “My father, sir.”  Aedion waited and the man seemed to realize he was supposed to elaborate.  “He was a weapons maker in Orynth before the fall, sir.”  
  
Aedion was pretty sure the man was going to faint off his horse if he kept talking to him, so he nodded and jogged Marcra back to Cathal.  “Interesting young man,” he said.  
  
Cathal gave him a sideways look.  “Not sure you can comment on his age, he’s about two years older than you.”  Then he laughed when Aedion cursed under his breath.  “I’m sure he has quite a story, though we’ve barely gotten him to talk the whole trip.”  
  
“We’ll give him to Raedan,” Aedion said, laughing himself.  “He’ll talk, he won’t have a choice.”  
  
“Now, that’s just mean.”  
  
They rode through the gates and headed straight to the corrals and the finally finished stable.  Aedion did, in fact, turn the new weapons maker over to Raedan for a tour while he dragged the others into the meeting room to meet with all the officers.    
  
Nobody took Cathal’s story well.  “I should have gone,” Aedion said, shaking his head, frustration flooding his veins.  
  
“No,” Cathal snapped.  “If you had been there blood would have been shed, and there is far too much likelihood that it would’ve been yours.”  
  
A debate erupted then about the next best step and Aedion sat back and let it wash over him, though he couldn’t keep himself from drumming his fingers on his knee.  Hay took a rare stand that going back to attempt further negotiations was a very poor idea, and even Dewar accepted that.  Grant bemoaned the fact that he hadn’t gone personally, and Aedion advised him it wasn’t worth the risk, neatly ignoring that it was the same admonishment Cathal had just given him.  
  
The meeting broke up, and Aedion remained behind to draft a letter to Adarlan.  Cathal waited with him, though a quick look showed him sagging.  By the time Aedion was sealing the envelope, gentle snores were emanating from the chair next to him.  Feeling a bit guilty, he put a hand on Cathal’s shoulder, startling him awake.  
  
“Come on, let’s get some food into you and then you can get some sleep.”  
  
With Cathal staggering after him, they made their way to the mess hall.  Raedan joined them shortly after they sat, talking before he’d even slid into his chair.  “Boy, Cathal, if I hadn’t known your life had always been shit I would’ve asked you what lucky star you were born under.”  Aedion kicked Raedan gently under the table but Cathal just looked confused.  Raedan went on, grinning so widely it was a miracle his face didn’t split in half.  “Conor Shaw.”  
  
“That name sounds familiar,” Aedion said, at the same time Cathal said, “Yeah?”  
  
“The new weapons master,” Raedan said to Aedion.  “He said you’d know his father, Weston Shaw.”  
  
An image of a wizened man with skin like leather and burns criss-crossing his forearms came into Aedion’s head at the name.  “You’re joking.”  Raedan shook his head as he chewed on a mouthful of bread.  “You have to be.”  
  
“Nope,” Raedan said as soon as he swallowed.  “He just about pissed himself when he saw you.”  
  
Cathal looked between them in confusion.  “Am I going to get this story or do I need to drag it out of you?”  
  
“Weston Shaw was my uncle’s preferred weapons maker,” Aedion said slowly.  “Conor…he was always around the castle.  You could say we grew up together, though really I only spoke to him a handful of times.”  He shook his head, remembering tussles in the stables with the other boys after they had mocked him or Aelin.  Conor was usually on the sidelines, always quick to break things up.  He dug his short nails into his palm, irritated he hadn’t recognized him.  He should have recognized him.  “How the hell did he end up in the middle of nowhere apprenticing for a village blacksmith?”  
  
“Evidently everything went to shit after the takeover.  He didn’t say it quite like that, but…”  
  
After Weston had gone to the butchering blocks, no doubt.  It was actually a miracle Conor hadn’t followed him.  Aedion felt like the floor was shifting under his feet, but he tried to rise anyway.  Raedan grabbed his sleeve.  “Leave him for tonight, brother.”  It was rare for Raedan to call him that, and Cathal’s quick eyes looked between them.  Aedion settled back into his chair, a thousand memories plucking at him as he finished his meal in silence.  
  
Cathal stopped so abruptly when they left the mess hall that Aedion almost crashed into him.  Raedan snickered behind them.  “Sorry, I forgot the tent was gone,” Cathal said.  
  
“You must be tired,” Aedion replied, “I don’t think I’ve ever heard you apologize before.”  Cathal flipped him off and he laughed.  “This way.”  Aedion turned and led him to the newly finished house.   
  
“What…no, Aedion,” Cathal said, stopping at the steps.  Aedion turned and they stared at each other for a long moment.  Grant approached then, murmured something unintelligible, and pushed past them into the house.    
  
“There are four bedrooms,” Aedion said quietly.  “Right now, Dewar and his wife, Grant, and I each have one, and one is empty.  If you really don’t want it, I’ll put someone else there because we need as much space as possible in the barracks, but I’d prefer not to have to.”  
  
He wished he knew how to interpret Cathal’s expression; it looked almost pained.  But all he said was, “Why?”  
  
“Because I trust you.”  That didn’t seem to help whatever was bothering Cathal, but he followed Aedion up the steps and inside.  Aedion pointed out Cathal’s room, which already contained the meager possessions he had brought with him from Orynth.  Once Cathal had headed into the bathroom they shared, Aedion snagged Grant from down the hall and dragged him back to the meeting room.  Raedan was there with some ale; Kelso joined them not long after; and they spent the next couple of hours batting around ideas about the Millar situation.    
  
There was a bite in the night air when Aedion returned to his room; the camp smelled like snow.  He could hear Cathal’s slow, regular breathing through the door, and used the bathing room as quietly as possible before settling into his own bed.  He awoke in the wee hours as he usually did, and when it was obvious he wouldn’t be able to fall back asleep he lit the lamp and pulled out one of his books.    
  
He hadn’t read much when he heard movement, and Cathal knocked once before walking in through the open bathroom door.  “Sorry,” Aedion said, getting to his feet so he could turn out the light.  “I didn’t mean to wake you.”  
  
“You didn’t,” Cathal replied with a shrug.  “I’ve been awake for a bit, and I saw your light come on.”  
  
Aedion turned to face him, leaving the light on.  They had slept in the same tent for months, but somehow this felt different, felt new.  He wanted to close the space between him, but he didn’t know how to interpret the battle he could see in Cathal’s eyes as they ran over his shirtless torso.  “I’m not sure what I owe you for not making me hunt you down in a blizzard,” he finally said.  
  
“I’m sure I’ll think of something.”    
  
Which of them made the first move he was never sure.  Perhaps they moved at the same time.  All he knew was the press of wind-roughened lips against his own, the feel of fingers tangling in his overlong hair, the warm solidness of that strong body under his hands.    
  
He pulled back just for a moment to read Cathal’s face as he tugged gently at the worn shirt blocking his access.  Cathal gave a small amused noise and yanked the shirt over his head.  Aedion reached for him, sliding one hand around over the broad muscles of his back, the other up into the close-cropped hair at the back of his head.  Cathal shivered a little under his touch but didn’t pull away.  No, he leaned in closer until they were pressed against each other, all that careful distance they had always maintained vaporizing.   
  
Desire roared through him when he felt Cathal’s response against his thigh, so fierce it bordered on need.  So Aedion released him, stepping back slightly, before he could cross any unknown boundaries.  He couldn’t help but grin briefly at the frustrated sound Cathal made, even as he bent to kiss him again.  
  
“What do you want, Cathal,” he murmured against his lips.  
  
“I don’t know,” Cathal admitted, shifting to press his mouth to Aedion’s jaw, then his throat.  He stopped and looked up into Aedion’s face.  “I haven’t…I haven’t been with anybody in a long time.”  He paused, searching for words.  “Three years.”  Aedion reached up, cupping Cathal’s stubbled jaw in his hand, running a thumb over his cheek.    
  
“I’m not in any rush, Cathal,” he said, ignoring the protest from his cock.    
  
“I don’t want to stop,” Cathal whispered.  His calloused hands slipped around Aedion’s waist, tugging him closer until they were chest to chest again.    
  
Aedion’s own fingers began to explore, mapping out every muscle, every scar.  “Can I touch you?” he asked, lips brushing the shell of Cathal’s ear.  
  
“Only if I can touch you,” was his shuddering response.  
  
That was all Aedion needed to hear.  He backed towards the bed, towing Cathal with him, and then they were a tangle of limbs and lips and teeth.  The throaty noise Cathal made as Aedion gripped him echoed in Aedion’s blood, setting him aflame.  He was lost in him, lost in them, wanting more, wanting this closeness and heat and mixed panting breaths to never end.      
  
A hand on his ass, sliding down, spreading him, shot a bolt of panic through him and he was up and across the room with a snarl before anything else had registered.  The man - Cathal - got to his feet slowly, warily, but all Aedion could see was that he was between himself and the door.  They stared at each other for a long moment, everything in Aedion’s body screaming at him to get out get out get out.  “I need to go,” he finally growled.  Cathal didn’t move.  “I’m trying very hard not to hurt you right now.”  
  
“I know,” Cathal said, voice cracking.  “I know.  But you can’t go outside like that.”  Aedion looked down, startled to find himself still naked, still hard.  Cathal crouched down and picked up Aedion’s pants, tossing them at him.  By the time Aedion had pulled them on, a shirt had landed at his feet, and he yanked that on as well.  Cathal stepped nimbly out of the way and Aedion was gone, down the stairs and out of the small house without being aware of anything but his own movement.  
  
The cold air was a slap, and it brought him back to himself.  Tiny snowflakes were falling, only to disappear into the grass that glimmered silver in the moonlight.  The ropes he had felt digging into his arms were dissolving with each blink, each breath, until he was free.  The frozen ground bit into his bare feet but he didn’t mind.  This was real.  This was real.  
  
He heard a door open and close quietly behind him, and he could smell leather and pine resin.  After several deep breaths, he turned, expecting to see pity or disgust or horror or guilt in Cathal’s eyes.  Expecting something other than the flat pools of rage he found staring back at him.  His breath caught for just a moment, not in fear but in recognition.  
  
Cathal broke the silence first.  “I’m guessing I have your lover to thank for dispatching the man responsible for this.”  His voice held even more gravel than normal.  
  
Aedion bared his teeth in his reply.  “Mikkal killed one of them. I killed another one.”  
  
“Another one.”  The tension in his frame was building and he took a step closer to Aedion, fists clenching and unclenching at his sides.  
  
Aedion gave the barest of nods, not wanting to tell the whole story but needing to.  “The third is still alive, as far as I know.”  
  
“Three -”  He broke off sharply, his swallow audible.  “How the hell are you still alive.”  
  
It wasn’t really a question, but Aedion answered anyway.  “I was too sore to climb the watch tower.”  
  
Cathal sucked in a sharp breath.  “That wasn’t what I meant, but thank you for the image.  Now I have to figure out how the hell to get that out of my head.”  
  
Aedion barked a laugh, surprising himself.  The dead fury in Cathal’s eyes lessened slightly at the sound.  “I should have told you before,” Aedion said, sliding a little closer.  He remembered a small cottage on the edge of the woods, a healer with a light touch on his arm.  _Tell your lover_ , she had said.  Only now did Aedion realize it was just as much for them as for himself.  
  
Shaking his head, Cathal held up a hand as if to touch Aedion’s face then stopped himself.  “I should’ve asked.  I knew you’d been hurt, I just…it didn’t occur to me in the moment.”  All the anger went out of him then, and it was like watching shed clothes drop to the floor, something human-shaped but empty.  He turned away, arm falling to his side.  
  
“No,” Aedion said, grabbing his wrist and pulling him back.  “Don’t do this, don’t walk away from me now.”  
  
Cathal whipped around.  “No,” he said fervently, pressing his palm against Aedion’s chest.  “I’m not walking away from you, I thought… I thought you would want me gone.”  
  
“Cathal.”  
  
After a pause, he answered, “Yes?”  
  
“Just…Don’t think.”   
  
Cathal snorted.  “If that’s your motto, I’m inclined to side with Colonel Millar.”  
  
Aedion laughed and started walking back to the house, a sudden wave of cold exhaustion washing through him.  “Come inside, before I get frostbite.”  
  
“You really do take your own advice a bit too seriously,” Cathal said, evidently just noticing his bare feet.  
  
Aedion sent a rude gesture over his shoulder as he opened the door as quietly as he could.  Cathal hesitated at Aedion’s bedroom door until Aedion gestured him in.  When the door was closed behind them, Aedion took Cathal’s face in his hands.  “Will you stay with me?” he asked.  “Just sleep, for tonight.”  
  
Cathal’s lips twitched up and he stood up on his toes to caress Aedion’s lips with his own.  “Only if you put socks on.”  
  
When the sun came up a few hours later, Aedion woke up wrapped around someone for the first time in over a year.  Cathal was already awake, or had never slept; his dark eyes were softer than Aedion had ever seen them.  As his mind cleared, Aedion thought perhaps Cathal had been talking to him, there was a background of quiet words to what he remembered of his dreams.  Gentle fingers pushed Aedion’s hair back off his face, then lips brushed his jaw before Cathal extracted himself and went through the shared bathing room into his own room.  Aedion absent-mindedly touched the spot Cathal had kissed, feeling the small scar, the only visible mark he bore from that night.  
  
*****  
  
Cathal closed the door and leaned back against it.  Gods, he thought he had cared about Aedion before.  But now, after spending the last few hours listening to him breathe, feeling every twitch and jolt of his sleep, his warmth leaching through their clothes…  
  
He had found himself talking, even knowing Aedion was asleep.  Telling him the almost-forgotten stories from his childhood, from his grandmother before she had died and he had ended up on the street.  Stories of fae warriors and kings and queens, tales of magic and forbidden love, legends of the forest.  He didn’t know why, but the words wouldn’t stop falling from his tongue.    
  
Three years ago he had awakened in an unfamiliar bright room with these same stories on his lips, and no knowledge of how he had gotten there.  He still didn’t know how he had ended up here.  How he had somehow ended up sharing a bed with Aedion after losing all right to that type of happiness so long ago.  But it had never been like this, he had never felt quite like this.  Never been quite so out of his depth.   
  
He was in so much trouble.


	21. Chapter 21

Aedion had just finished up his daily meeting with the officers when one of the young recruits came to fetch him, stating that there was a visitor asking for him.  His mind was still mostly on Colonel Millar as he followed the man; he knew by the muttered curses coming from his right that Cathal’s mind was similarly occupied.  The night’s rest had brought no more clarity on the situation to any of the officers and the meeting had been tense and irritable.  
  
The visitor was a lone man with military bearing who stood straight and proud next to his horse.  Aedion’s men were in a loose circle around him, and they all bowed when he walked up.  The stranger did not move but held Aedion’s eye.  “Captain Marks, I believe,” Aedion said.  
  
When the stranger did not bow, Grant spoke up from behind Aedion.  “Marks, I have known you since you were a boy.  You will bow to Colonel Ashryver or I will make you do so.”  Aedion bit the inside of his cheek to keep from laughing at the consternation that crossed the man’s face as he slowly dipped into a bow.  
  
Aedion returned it, then asked, “What brings you here, Captain, this close to snowfall?”  
  
“Your men took something that doesn’t belong to them,” Marks said.  “Colonel Millar will not stand for that.”  
  
Aedion glanced at Cathal, who looked as lost as he was.  It really wasn’t in the character of any of the men to steal anything; well, perhaps Cathal in a younger life, but not now.  He looked back at Marks.  “I’m afraid I don’t know what you’re referring to.”  
  
“The weapons maker.  Shaw.”  
  
Surprise ran through Aedion, followed quickly by fury.  “I must have missed the part where Conor Shaw was anything but a free man, able to make his own decisions.”  
  
Marks took an involuntary step back before clenching his hands and raising his chin.  “We are responsible for Shaw making it out of Orynth.  We are the ones who set him up with that apprenticeship.  He belongs to us.”  
  
Aedion huffed.  “Conor Shaw belongs to nobody but himself, Captain.  My men paid off his apprenticeship, which he was miserable in by the way, and he chose to come with them.”  He cocked his head, not trying to suppress the menace in the movement.  “Or are you under the impression that apprenticeship and slavery mean the same thing?”  
  
“You are a fool, Ashryver.”  At that, three dozen men reached for their weapons.  Aedion lifted his hand and they all quieted as he stepped into Marks’ space, a hands-breadth away from him, fixing him with a glare.  
  
“Raedan,” he said, not turning away from Marks, “fetch Conor.  Let’s see what he makes of this.”  
  
“Yes, sir.”  Aedion was too furious at Marks to smile at the honorific that Raedan had never before used in addressing him.  
  
“You see, Captain,” Aedion said softly, so only Marks could hear, “I have been held against my will.  For two and a half years, I was held.  If you or Colonel Millar thinks for one moment that I will allow that to happen here, to a citizen of Terrasen, you need to think again.”  
  
Marks quailed before his rage, choosing to study Cathal’s knees, evidently.  They stood in silence for the couple of minutes it took for Raedan to return.  At Raedan’s polite cough, Aedion took a step back and angled himself to address Conor.  
  
“This is Captain Marks,” he said to the young man, to his one-time friend who would not meet his eyes.  “He was sent by Colonel Millar.”  Conor shifted on his feet, just a subtle movement before stilling.  “He is under the impression that we brought you here against your will.”  Conor didn’t move, didn’t seem to be breathing even, and he didn’t speak.  “It is your choice, Conor,” Aedion said, raising his voice to carry over the gathering crowd.  “In front of all these witnesses, I swear to you, if you want to stay here, we will protect you.  If you want to go to Colonel Millar’s, we will allow you to go unmolested.  If you want to leave and go anywhere else in the world, we will support you.  I will swear this with my blood if necessary.  This is your life, and you are free to live it where and how you wish.”  
  
Finally, Conor lifted clear eyes to meet Aedion’s.  “I want to stay with you, Prince,” he said, bowing deeply.  “I want to serve you.”  
  
Aedion turned to Marks.  “He made his choice.  Go along now and relay it to your colonel.”  
  
Marks rounded on Conor.  “You don’t know what you’re doing, Shaw,” he growled.  “You’re turning your back on your people, you’re spitting on your father’s memory -”  He broke off abruptly as Aedion’s hand wrapped around his throat and lifted him off the ground.  
  
“You heard him,” Aedion snarled.  “Your presence is no longer needed here.”  He set him carefully back on his feet, and Marks stumbled backward a few steps, pulling his startled horse with him.    
  
“Colonel Millar will not be happy about this, he claimed Shaw years ago,” Marks gasped.  
  
“My condolences,” Aedion said, stalking closer.  “You can inform him that I will not be happy if I hear that he is keeping men as chattel.  A person is not to be held or coerced, they must serve freely or be released.  Or does he completely reject the legacy of Orlon that he fought so valiantly for in the past?”  When Marks did not reply, he turned to Cathal.  “See him out, please.  If he doesn’t leave quietly, deal with him.”  
  
Cathal gave a wolfish grin as he stepped up to Marks, hand on his dagger hilt.  Grant joined him at Marks’s other shoulder, and Kemp, who had been watching intently in the first row of the circle, moved to the captain’s back.    
  
Conor was staring at him, and Aedion shoved his fury down mercilessly before walking over to him.  “I mean it, Conor,” he said quietly, holding out his hand.  “You are free to do as you please.”  
  
Slowly, Conor reached out to clasp palms.  Aedion grinned at the feel of those rough callouses against his own.  “I don’t want to cause trouble, sir,” Conor said.    
  
“You never did, did you?  Even when we were boys you were always the peacemaker.”  Conor looked up at him in surprise.  “I’m sorry I didn’t recognize you yesterday.  I should have.”  
  
“It’s been a long time, sir,” was the shy response.  
  
“Not that long.”  Aedion released his hand and turned towards the armory.  “Now.  You need to tell me what supplies you need so we can get them.”  He looked back when he realized Conor wasn’t following him.  “Are you all right?  I meant what I said, if you want to leave you can.”  
  
Conor shook his head, his throat bobbing as he swallowed audibly.  “I just…I can’t believe you’re here.”  His voice cracked and he shook his head again.  
  
Aedion didn’t know what to say.  He didn’t understand the look in Conor’s eyes.  It looked like hope.  It broke his heart.  
  
*****  
  
Captain Marks was quiet and sullen as he was escorted through the gates of the camp.  Once they were well clear of the walls, Grant grabbed his arm.  “This is why,” he said.  
  
Marks glared at his hand for a moment before dragging his eyes up to Grant’s face.  “Why what?”  
  
“Why we follow him.  Oh, I know you’re all wondering why Dewar and Kelso and I fell in line, but you just saw it.”  
  
“I just saw a soft-hearted boy, nothing more.”  
  
Cathal snorted, but before he could retort, Grant spoke again.  “You really missed the point of that, didn’t you.  You think he’s soft-hearted?  No.  He just understands.  He sees everyone in that camp - every single gods-damned person, from the kitchen lads to the blacksmiths to me and Dewar, as equals.”  
  
“Then he’s just the fool I took him for.”    
  
“Not as equals in rank or talent, you imbecile, but equally deserving.  He won’t ask anyone to do something he wouldn’t do himself.  That’s why there’s a thousand men in there who haven’t known him six months but who would follow him anywhere, even unto death.  
  
“Look, Marks, I’ve always liked you.  You’re a good soldier, a good man.  What Ashryver’s doing… He’s being realistic about how to minimize damage to Terrasen.”  
  
“He’s turning us all into lapdogs for Adarlan, you mean,” Marks snapped.  “He has no idea what he’s doing, how could he?  He’s never fought in a war, not really; and you are all pretending like some, what, seventeen, eighteen year old boy can handle the Bane?  Is that a rutting joke?”    
  
Grant studied him for a while before answering.  “You want to know when I knew he could handle this?  When he and Rosach here came to see me, I’d had some warning from Dewar.  I’d heard all the same bullshit you had, and I wanted to see him for myself.  So I had them jumped.  Five armed men against two who have no warning.”  Grant laughed, and Cathal found himself smiling a little grimly at the memory.  “Ashryver had four of them disarmed and on the ground without ever pulling a weapon while Rosach took care of the fifth.  I’ve never seen anything like it.  And Ashryver was furious; not with them, but with me.  Not for testing him, but for putting my men at risk.  He could’ve killed them, and he knew it, and that was unacceptable to him.  And if you still can’t see why that is precious, why it’s worth following, then you deserve what you’ll get if you and Millar try to take him on.  Us.  Take us on.  Because you won’t win.”  
  
“You’re setting us up for a civil war, Grant.”  
  
“No.  I’m trying to preserve King Orlon’s legacy, that apparently you and Millar are looking to destroy.”  
  
“Ashryver’s not even related to Orlon, not by blood.”  
  
“That’s not what I meant.”  Grant cocked his head and tapped his chin once, twice while he examined Marks.  “What do you think King Orlon would have to say about you coming and acting like you own young Shaw, like you have some claim to him?”  Marks stared at him wordlessly, face reddening.  “What do you think King Orlon would say about you spending the past three years hiding in the mountains, not doing anything to help the innocent people who keep getting sentenced to slavery or death for minor crimes?”  
  
“Don’t try to claim you’ve done anything different, Grant.”  
  
“I’m not.  I haven’t.  I haven’t been like Rosach, who has been helping get people out of the city when they’ve been in danger.  I haven’t been like Lord Darrow, who’s been feeding the poor under the noses of the garrison.  But the thing is, when I saw a way of helping these people ride into my camp, I dropped everything to join him.  Colonel Millar won’t even talk with him when a peaceful invitation was extended, he’s too obsessed with holding onto power.  Am I wrong?”  
  
Marks was staring at his horse’s feet.  “Millar is keeping us in fighting shape.  He’s preparing us, in the event we can start to push back.”  
  
“If you think Ashryver’s doing any different, you’re the one who’s a fool.  Did you even look around the camp?  Now get on your damn horse and get out of my sight.”  
  
Marks did as he was told; the three men stood and watched him go.  Once he was out of earshot, Cathal turned to Grant.  “That was an impressive dressing down.  I feel like joining up all over again.”  
  
Grant laughed.  “It won’t make any difference, but he pissed me off.”  
  
“Remind me to stay on your good side.”  
  
“You can’t stay somewhere you’ve never been, Rosach.  I’m only tolerating you for Ashryver’s sake.”  But his smile was warm, and Cathal thought back to that final battle, when the fighting had paused and he had begged Grant to be allowed to go look for Luthias.  Though he had no memory of what happened afterwards, Grant’s wise, sad eyes when he had nodded permission were burned into his brain.  
  
They walked back to the camp, and Cathal found Aedion at the forge in the armory, talking to an still awestruck Conor Shaw.  Cathal nodded hello to the other two blacksmiths, who were listening intently as Shaw expounded on how adding some sort of fancy metal into a blade made it less likely to chip along the edge.  The four men were discussing how to source it, but Cathal tuned them out; all he could think about was when could he get Aedion alone, all he could hear was the hitch of the breath when he had grazed Aedion’s jaw with his lips.    
  
It took too long; he had to go do archery training before Aedion was finished, and then it was mealtime and the general bustle of shift change reporting.  At least Aedion got to eat in peace while Cathal and the other captains heard the reports; it seemed like the one time of day where there wasn’t a queue of people vying for his attention.  Cathal wondered how he kept it all straight.  
  
After dinner, Dewar snagged Aedion to bitch about something and Cathal went back to the house alone.  While he bathed, he wondered which room he should go to afterwards; he didn’t really know what Aedion would prefer, and the gods knew the man did enough for everyone.  He didn’t want to be just another person to be accommodated.    
  
He had just started scrubbing his hair when he heard a door close, and a few seconds later the bathroom door opened and Aedion came in.  Before Cathal could say anything, or even do more than sit up in surprise, Aedion had knelt next to the tub and taken Cathal’s face in his hands.  His mouth was not gentle, and neither was the response he elicited.    
  
“There is no way we will both fit in there,” Aedion said against his lips.  
  
“I’ll hurry.”  
  
Aedion went back into his room while Cathal rinsed in record time.  He was toweling off to the gurgling music of the draining water when Aedion returned, stripped of the thick layers the cold weather was requiring and frowning vaguely.  “I should bathe too,” he said, sniffing at himself.  
  
“I don’t care,” Cathal growled.  Aedion smiled his crooked smile at him and took hold of his elbows to pull him in close.  Cathal didn’t know what to do with his hands, so he kept them planted on Aedion’s arms until he was so lost in his mouth, in the slide of his tongue, that he let them wander up to brush the back of his neck and tangle in his hair.  
  
Somehow they ended up stumbling into Aedion’s room.  And if Cathal had not already surrendered himself wholly, the deep moan Aedion made as Cathal took him in his mouth, the light twitch of fingers in his hair, the stuttering breaths as he reached his climax would’ve done it.    There was something about the way he let himself become completely undone; then the way he undid Cathal in his turn.  It was too much; it would never be enough.  Laying tangled together afterwards, with weighty limbs and slow kisses, Cathal let a stealthy peace creep into his heart, and prayed to nonexistent gods that it would never end.  
  
*****  
  
Avis was sitting on the couch, ostensibly reading a book, when Delaney let herself into Mikkal’s apartment.  Only the fact that her eyes were fixed, not following words across the page, gave her away.  Maida leaped up from her spot on the floor where she had been practicing writing and greeted Delaney with a hug before leading her over to the notebook Cherise had given her.  Delaney praised her neat letters warmly, but couldn’t stop her eyes from darting to Avis, especially when she noticed the bottle clenched in her hand.    
  
Once Maida was returning to her work with satisfied enthusiasm, Delaney went to sit next to Avis, who still didn’t acknowledge her presence.  “Did you take it?” Delaney murmured.  
  
“Yes.”    
  
It was amazing, Delaney thought, how one word could mean so many different things.  How “yes” could be an exclamation of the greatest joy, or an indication of the most terrible heartbreak. She had no idea what the right response was.  Selfishly, she was happy that her sister wasn’t going to try to bear this when she was so young.  But she knew it wasn’t that easy, that there was some part of her sister that hadn’t want to make this choice.  
  
She settled for the conventional.  “Are you feeling all right?”  
  
Avis shrugged.  “Just some cramping, kind of like my usual monthly cycle.  Maybe a little worse.”  
  
Delaney debated whether to keep her mouth shut, and ended up losing the battle.  “What made you decide?”  
  
“Mikkal.”  Finally Avis looked at her, and must have read the surprise and confusion in her eyes.  “He was telling me about his mother, about how he had been worried she’d be upset about him being in love with Aedion?”  Delaney nodded vaguely.  “And then when he finally told her, she was only sad that he had to leave.  And I guess I realized that I don’t think I can do that.”  
  
“I’m not sure I know what you mean.”  
  
Avis turned her palms up, the amber bottle flashing in the lamplight.  “I think right now I’d be more like our mother than his.  And I don’t want to have a baby until I can be like her.”  
  
Delaney thought about that.  About how it had been she, not their mother, who had made sure the girls and Raedan had gotten enough to eat, had taught them to read, had soothed bumps and bruises and settled fights.  Most of the time she hadn’t even known where their mother was or what she was doing.  A fragment of a memory, from so long ago she couldn’t place it, floated up from somewhere: Mrs. Ferrars, soothing her over some unknown hurt, and her mother coming to take her away; her screaming and crying and clinging to the major’s wife until finally her own mother had given up and left her.  
  
She leaned over and kissed Avis on the cheek.  “You’re so brave, honey.”  
  
Avis tried to snort in derision, but it came out more as a hiccough, and then she was weeping.  She was sobbing so hard it seemed as if her body would break apart, and Delaney wrapped her arms around her, squeezing, trying to hold the pieces of her sister together.  Maida came over and stood in front of them, her face uncertain, confused tears swimming in her eyes.  When Avis’s shuddering finally quieted enough that she could talk, she confessed, “I don’t feel brave.  I feel like a coward.”  Her voice hitched, but she went on.  “I feel sad, and weak, and stupid for falling for it.  Falling for him.”    
  
Delaney spent a long minute brushing Avis’s hair back off her face.  “And that’s what makes you brave, sweetheart.”  
  
Avis was silent, almost limp in her arms, her breathing deep and slow as if in sleep though her eyes were open.  When Delaney shifted a little, Avis clutched at her, and she settled back in.  They were still sitting like that when Mikkal came home, and he gave her a small smile as he walked past them towards the kitchen, Maida bubbly at his side.  Delaney didn’t miss that his fingers trailed lightly along the back of the couch behind Avis, and she thanked him in her heart again and again.  
  
*****  
  
The room was just beginning to lighten when Aedion drifted awake, warm and comfortable.  He opened his eyes and looked at Cathal laying next to him, at the curve of his ear, the outline of his shoulder, the thick muscle of his arm where it lay outside the blanket.  He could just make out the dark shape of the tattoo on his shoulder blade that Aedion had memorized.  Two birds, a meadowlark and a swallow, dancing on the wind.  Muire and Luthias, Cathal had told him when he’d asked.  Every morning for weeks now, he had woken up like this, and it felt like it had always been that way.  
  
Cathal stirred next to him, and Aedion pulled him closer, brushing his lips against the back of his neck.  He made a quiet, contended noise in response, rolling himself halfway over to look at Aedion with one dark eye.  “Please tell me we don’t have to get up yet.”  
  
“Not yet,” Aedion said.  Cathal rolled the rest of the way over, pressing a kiss to Aedion’s shoulder before resting his head on it.  
  
Aedion closed his eyes again, relishing the feel of Cathal’s body pressed against his side, his arm around his chest, leg hitched over his hip.  It was like he had melted into the mattress; it was glorious.  
  
Cathal shifted, and Aedion dropped his chin to meet his mouth.  They kissed languidly, their intensity spent after hours and days exploring each other with their hands and mouths.  For someone who had managed to be celibate for three years, Cathal was certainly proving to be surprisingly insatiable.  Not that Aedion was complaining.  
  
Sleep was pulling at him; he couldn’t remember when it had been this easy to fall asleep, but it was getting close to dawn and he knew he shouldn’t succumb.  A calloused hand dragged lazily over his ribs, and he turned onto his side to face Cathal.  “Can I ask you something?” Cathal murmured.  
  
“Mmm.”    
  
“Without you getting pissy?”  
  
Aedion’s eyes snapped open at that, and he raised himself up on one elbow.  “Doubtful, if you’re going to put it that way.”  
  
Cathal glanced away for a second before meeting Aedion’s gaze and reaching up to cup the back of Aedion’s neck in his hand.  “Are we ever going to talk about it?”  
  
“About what?”  
  
“About what happened to you.”  
  
Every muscle in Aedion’s body went taut and he sat up.  Cathal mirrored him, unconsciously blocking his exit.  “What the hell, Cathal?”  
  
“It doesn’t have to be now.”  
  
Aedion’s chest was tightening, and his hands clenched around the blanket.  “I don’t see why it has to happen at all,” he ground out through his teeth.  
  
“This is why,” Cathal said, gesturing at him.  Aedion glared at him; Cathal’s face was serious, concerned.  “Because it hurts you so much.”  
  
“And what, you think talking is going to help?  Or do you just want the details.  Do you want to hear about how they called me in, how they knocked me out and tied me down, how they -” He broke off, breathing as if he had just run his laps.  
  
“No, Aedion, I don’t want that.”  He squeezed his eyes closed, pinching the bridge of his nose.  “Damnit, I don’t want to know any of that, not unless it helps you for me to know.  But I think pretending nothing happened isn’t doing you any favors.”    
  
“And what, you’re some sort of expert in talking about shit?” Aedion spat.  “You never talk about Muire and Luthias.”  It wasn’t true, though; ever since that day in the summer when Cathal first told him about Luthias, he had started mentioning them.  Not often, but enough.  Little bits and pieces, memories and thoughts, casually dropped in.  And slowly the pain had been leaching out of his voice and peace had been suffusing it.  Aedion hadn’t realized it until this moment.  
  
Cathal didn’t bite, though.  He just said calmly, “Whatever you want to know, I’ll tell you.”  
  
Aedion pressed his fingers into his eyes until he could see stars hurtling in the blackness behind his lids.  Dropping his hands, he started to climb over Cathal’s feet to get out of the bed.    
  
“Did you realize you won’t touch my ass?”    
  
Cathal’s question froze him.  He sank back down on the bed.  “Is that what this is about?”  Aedion gave a bitter laugh.  “Don’t worry, I’ll fuck you if you want me to.”  
  
“Thank you for constantly proving my point, Aedion.”  Cathal shook his head, blowing out a frustrated breath.  “I’m more than content with the way we make love.  But it kills me, it absolutely kills me, to know that your worst nightmare is that someone might want to fuck you.”    
  
Cathal might as well have punched him in the gut.  He couldn’t breathe, couldn’t move; could only stare at his hands where they had fallen uselessly in his lap.  Seconds or minutes passed before the mattress shifted and Aedion felt gentle fingers touch his hair, then lips brush his forehead.   “I’m sorry,” Cathal murmured.  “I shouldn’t have said anything, I have no right to push.”  
  
Aedion shook his head, not knowing what exactly he was trying to convey, comfort or censure.  Even now he was struggling to breathe against the roaring in his ears, to force down the surge of nausea.  A large part of him wanted to pull away, to lash out; it would be easier.  But if Cathal didn’t have the right to push him, who did?  So instead he leaned back, let those strong arms wrap around him for long wordless minutes until the breaking day forced them to move.  
  
Of course it was snowing.  Every other day seemed to add to the growing mounds, and Aedion was already chafing against the need to be inside.  South of the Staghorns there was always snow in the winter, but rarely enough to limit outdoor activity for long; but up here, the uncleared areas were already up past his knees and winter had just begun.  And now he was going to have the argument with Cathal chasing him all day.    
  
Not that it was obvious; Cathal sat in his usual spot to Aedion’s right at meals and at meetings, and they continued to fumble around with attempting training in the mess hall in between.  They couldn’t afford to lose any ground, not with Millar’s plans unknown, but schooling footwork on snow and ice seemed to be begging for injuries.  Practicing in the hall was the best alternative they had come up with, but it felt like the men spent more time moving tables and chairs out of the way and then back again than they did actually training.  
  
After the evening meal, Raedan dragged him to the armory, where Conor shyly showed him the first several blades he had produced.  They all had plain hilts, just a simple guard, grip, and undecorated round pommel, but Aedion brushed off Conor’s apologies.  “Didn’t you ever see the sword of Orynth?” he asked.  “The hilt was undecorated, the pommel just a fragment of bone.  But the blade…the blade was a work of art.”    
  
He tested the weight and balance of each one carefully.  Some were rejected immediately as too light; Raedan played with those, looking impressed.  Finally Aedion narrowed it down to two and went outside to do some of his routine exercises.  One of them was almost perfect, so close he wanted to keep it but Conor showed his bit of spine and refused.  “Not until it’s right,” Conor insisted, refusing to hear Aedion’s argument that it was much better than the piece of shit he’d been carrying.  “Just give me a couple more days, and you can test it again.”  
  
The mess hall sounded raucous as he walked past, so he and Raedan joined Grant and a couple of other men in the meeting room for a last glass of ale before heading back to the house.  When he entered his room, Cathal wasn’t waiting for him as he had expected.  He pushed into the empty bathing room, then turned back into his room.  There was a note on his desk in Cathal’s rough scrawl.  _I understand if you don’t want me here tonight._    
  
Aedion turned and roared, “Cathal!” in the direction of his room.  When there was no response, he stomped through the bathing room and shoved the door open.  Cathal wasn’t in his room, but he had dropped his papers on his bed and his dirty clothes were still in a heap in the corner.  Going out into the hall, he pulled up short when he saw the doors at the end of it were open and Grant and Bridie Dewar were poking their heads out in concern.  
  
“Sorry,” he called.  “I didn’t mean to bother you.”  
  
Grant laughed and pulled back into his room, but Mrs. Dewar came down the hall to meet him.  “It’s all right, dear,” she said, “we know him.  We know how pig-headed he can be.”  She patted his arm and he abruptly felt like he was about eight years old.  “But right now he’s with the Major, I’m not sure what they’re doing.”  Aedion always thought it strange she referred to her husband that way, but as far as he knew Dewar didn’t have a first name; at least, he’d never heard one.  “Come on, I’ll make you some tea.”  
  
He started to protest but she was leading him inexorably downstairs to the small kitchen.  Before he knew what was happening he was sitting in a chair, water was heating, a plate of cookies was in front of him, and she was spooning chamomile into a teapot.  Attempting escape was tempting but unlikely to be successful, so he surrendered and took a cookie. “Now,” she said, pouring the water into the teapot then coming to sit across the table from him. “I know you can fight your own battles, we all know that. You mustn’t take him being so protective as any kind of an insult.”  
  
Aedion looked at her blankly. “I’m not sure...”  
  
“It’s just his way. He won’t hear a bad word spoken of anyone he cares about. And he’s not used to having someone like you, either.”  
  
He was completely out of his depth at this point. “I really don’t know what you mean.”  
  
“Well, Muire and young Breck, they needed his help, you see.” She got up to pour the tea into cups and handed him one. His fingers curled reflexively around the warmth. “And of course you don’t, but he’ll never see that, not really.”  She cocked her head to the side as she smiled at him, looking for all the world like a sparrow in an apron. “I can’t imagine he’s an easy man to be with, especially for someone so young and inexperienced.”  
  
There was a gust of cold air as the front door opened then, and two pairs of stamping feet, then Dewar’s voice calling hello. “Thank the gods,” Aedion muttered under his breath as he stood up, still clutching his cup. “Thank you for the tea,” he said, with a small bow to Mrs. Dewar. She beamed at him and handed him the plate of cookies. He stared down at it for a second then fled, nearly crashing into Dewar and Cathal where they were knocking off snow in the entryway, each bearing an armload of firewood.  
  
“Help,” Aedion mouthed at Cathal as he half-ran up the stairs, trying not to spill anything. He heard Dewar and his wife greeting each other, then the sound of wood hitting the stone in front of the fireplace before a heavy tread followed him more slowly up the stairs. He had just set the plate and cup on his desk when the door closed, and he turned to find Cathal leaning against it.  
  
“Dewar already gave me a tongue-lashing, I don’t need another one from you,” Cathal said drily.  
  
Aedion wondered if he had stepped into another dimension, or if there was a whole layer of shit that went on in this camp that he was blissfully ignorant of. He was musing on that when he smelled blood, hidden beneath the fresher scents of cut wood and smoke. “What the hell?” He closed the distance between them in one stride and began examining Cathal, who stood passively, just watching. The source was Cathal’s right hand, bruised and swollen with mangled knuckles. Suddenly Mrs. Dewar’s ramblings made a lot more sense. “Seriously, what the hell happened?”  
  
Cathal’s neck and ears flushed a dark red. “Nothing, it’s nothing.”  
  
“It’s not nothing, did you break your hand?” Aedion felt gingerly along the bones, but nothing gave that unstable creak that always made his knees weak, even when it wasn’t his own fracture.  
  
“No, I didn’t break it,” Cathal said impatiently. “I’ve been fighting longer than you’ve been alive.”  
  
That earned him Aedion’s evilest glare. “And are you going to tell me why in Hellas’s name you’re punching people? If you haven’t noticed, these men are all on our side.”  
  
“That doesn’t mean they can’t be arrogant pricks.”  
  
Aedion turned away to rummage in one of his drawers. He had kept some of the poultice the healer had given him after he’d returned from Garvey’s, and he pulled it out now and sniffed at the herbs wrapped in the cloth. They still smelled fine, so he went into the bathing room and dampened them, then came back and took Cathal’s hand, resting the cloth across his knuckles. Cathal watched all of this with a distant expression, looking almost as if it was happening to somebody else.  
  
“All right, now talk. Tell me what happened.”  
  
Cathal pushed away from the door, moving to sit on the bed. Aedion followed, standing in front of him, arms crossed. “I don’t know if you know the way some people talk about you?”  
  
Aedion shrugged. “I’m not sure how much I care, unless they’re plotting to kill me.”  
  
Cathal’s mouth tightened. “What if they were talking about whether they could get you bent over a bed, do you care then?”  
  
Aedion’s heart stuttered for a second. “What?”  
  
“What if they were speculating how hard it would be to get you drunk enough to get down on your knees?”  His voice was deep and coarse with rage.  “Or imagining, quite vividly might I add, how your mouth will look on them? That doesn’t bother you? Because it bothers the hell out of me.”  
  
“Shit.” It came out as little more than a whisper as Aedion rubbed a hand up the back of his neck. It had never occurred to him that men – his men – would even think about him like that. “Did you kill them?” At that moment, it seemed a reasonable assumption.  
  
Cathal snorted. “No, though I don’t think they’ll talk about you like that again, at least not while I’m in earshot. Well, one of them won’t be talking much at all for a while.” Aedion looked at him quizzically. “The healer’s wiring his jaw at the moment.”  
  
A memory of a sunny field popped into his head then, with Gillies telling him Cathal was invaluable in a fight. He shook his head, struggling against a smile. “You could’ve just told them, you know,” he said, inching closer until he was standing between Cathal’s knees. Cathal looked up at him through his eyelashes. “What my mouth looks like on you.” He bent down, brushing Cathal’s nose with his own in silent question. Cathal buried his uninjured hand in Aedion’s hair as he stretched up to meet his lips. “And that you don’t have to get me drunk to get me on my knees. That might’ve been just as effective.”  
  
“Less satisfying, though,” Cathal said against his mouth. Aedion knew what he meant; could almost feel the crack of bone under his own knuckles.  He pulled back, and he saw it then in those dark eyes that were so unlike his own, saw what he had always felt but never understood enough to put into words.  It was the same feeling that had driven his need to swear the blood oath to Aelin, that still dogged him even now that she was gone.  Seeing it in Cathal was like hearing a harp string plucked that resonated perfectly with the one vibrating in his heart.  His hand was trembling slightly when he touched Cathal’s cheek and he didn’t even try to hide it.  
  
*****  
  
It was strange, how easy it had been to get used to this, Cathal thought as he lay with his head cushioned on Aedion’s shoulder.  He could hear Aedion’s heart beating; it was slightly out of synchrony with the throbbing in his bruised hand, just enough to keep him awake.  It didn’t help that he was still kicking himself for their argument that morning, for his clumsiness especially.  As usual, he had brought a sword to a wood-carving contest, and he had done the unforgivable and hurt Aedion in the process.  
  
He flexed his fingers, relishing the pull at the splits across his knuckles.  He had been ignoring several of the younger members of the camp who had been speculating about Aedion for weeks; rather unfortunate for them that they chose that day to drink a little too much and get a little too explicit in their conversation.  Not that he wouldn’t have knocked them around for speaking of any of the officers that way at another time, but he probably would’ve stopped before breaking bones.  Maybe.  Though remembering the worst of what they’d said, the things he hadn’t been able to bring himself to repeat to Aedion… No, he wouldn’t have stopped.  
  
Some of his restlessness must have been transmitting, because Aedion dropped a light kiss on his hair and murmured, “Are you hurting?”  He could’ve laughed at that, at the idea that something so insignificant, so well-earned, could be enough to bother him.  At his denial strong fingers began making circles up his spine.  Most likely Aedion meant it to be soothing but it had the opposite effect.  
  
He shifted his hips away from Aedion’s thigh; they had settled in only to sleep by unspoken agreement, and he didn’t want to ruin whatever fragile trust lay between them.  Those fingers stilled, then moved to trace the tattoo on his shoulder, the one he didn’t need to see to know every curve and line of it.  
  
“What kind of bird would I be?” Aedion asked.  
  
Cathal considered for a long moment.  His first thought was some sort of bird of prey, a hawk or an eagle, but even they were subject to the whims of the winds.  “You’re not a bird,” he said, twisting to try to look at Aedion’s face, feeling the flash of hurt even in the dark.  “You’re too grounded, too…solid.”  He paused again, tapping his fingers absent-mindedly against Aedion’s chest, in the rhythm of his heartbeat.  “You can’t be blown off course.  No.  You’re more of a wolf.”  
  
 He felt the rumble of Aedion’s chuckle more than he heard it.  “That’s funny,” Aedion said, “that’s how I’ve always thought of you.”  
  
Cathal settled back down into his comfortable position, but only for a few seconds before another thought occurred to him.  “What was going on when I got back tonight?  Why were you so flustered?”  
  
Aedion barked a laugh.  “Mrs. Dewar took it upon herself to explain to me your protective nature, and,” he started laughing harder, “sympathize with me on how my ‘inexperience’ would make it more difficult to understand you.”  
  
“Wait, what?”  Cathal sat up and spun to face him, then started grinning.  “Did you tell her that you’ve fucked more people in a week than I have in my entire life?”  
  
“Of course not!  I didn’t say anything!  She was throwing tea and cookies at me and patting me on the arm and what the hell was I supposed to do?”  
  
The image of tiny Bridie Dewar utterly cowing a completely baffled Aedion when she barely came up to his ribs had Cathal laughing himself senseless.  Finally an exasperated Aedion gave up on him and grabbed his arm and pulled him back down, tucking him in against him.  Cathal had finally quieted down, was beginning to feel the lull of sleep, when Aedion murmured, “She’s not exactly wrong about the experience, though.  I’ve fucked a lot of people, but this isn’t about that, is it?”  
  
The hesitation, the uncertainty in his quiet voice caused a cramp in Cathal’s chest that was more painful than his throbbing knuckles.  He took Aedion’s hand and lifted it to his mouth, kissing the palm gently before answering.  “No.  No, this isn’t about that.  This is much more.”    
  
*****  
  
Aedion ducked through the doorway to the healer’s quarters.  Three of her beds were occupied, the men shrinking away as he entered.  Ignoring them, he crossed to where she was sitting at her work table and greeted her warmly.  “I don’t suppose you have any extra poultices lying about?  Captain Rosach could use some, and I gave him my last last night.”  
  
She tutted and started digging through her drawers.  “Does he need me to pay him a visit?”  
  
Aedion grinned.  “I think he’d have my head if you did, he insists he’s fine.”  He glanced over his shoulder.  “How are these three idiots?”  
  
“Broken jaw, concussion, and I think just bruised ribs though there could be a stable fracture,” she said, pointing at each bed in turn.  “The Captain doesn’t pull his punches.”  
  
“No, he sure doesn’t.”  Accepting the bag she handed him, he strode over to the beds.  The men glanced up at him then looked away as one.    
  
“I’m going to assume that you understand why you are all in this predicament,” he said, waiting for their nod.  “And I hope that you also understand that it is unacceptable for you to talk about anyone in that way.  Not just me or the other officers, but anyone.  If I hear that you’re talking about a stable boy, or one of the kitchen maids, or another regular in that fashion, there will be trouble.  You are all adults, and you owe every single person here respect.  If you are interested in someone, talk to them like a normal person.  If they say no, walk away.  You do not try to trick someone, or get them drunk, or harass them.  If I hear otherwise, you’ll be dealing with me, and I promise you, I will make Captain Rosach look merciful.  Are we clear?”  
  
“Yes, sir,” said two of the men.  The third made an indistinct noise that Aedion took as agreement.  
  
“Good.  Now heal up.  I need you on those lines come spring.”  He nodded at the men, then turned on his heel and headed out into the cold winter sunshine.


	22. Chapter 22

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> NSFW.

Mikkal bent down to kiss Olie once more before straightening, fingers automatically finding the buttons on his shirt.  He hadn’t seen him in three years but it was easy to fall into their old pattern, their familiar lovemaking.  “How long are you in town?”  
  
Olie shrugged.  “Just a week, I think.”  His eyes roved over Mikkal and his mouth twitched up in one corner.  “I’m glad we ran into each other.”  
  
“Me too,” Mikkal said, smiling back.  Olie had been his first lover.  Circumstances and two wars had kept them largely separated but he hadn’t forgotten the inherent kindness of this man.  “Where are you off to once the King is done with you?”  
  
“Where do you think?” Olie shook his head.  “Fenharrow.  The northern part has quieted but there’s still quite a few pockets on Eyllwe’s border that are causing some problems.”  
  
Mikkal looked at him in surprise.  “I thought Fenharrow was under control by now.”  
  
“Well, if he’s pulling men from my camp, and your father’s…”  He didn’t need to finish.  Mikkal had heard that a company of his father’s men was heading down there under Major Ivry and had thought it odd at the time, but Olie was also stationed at the Terrasen border, just near the eastern shore.  The King must be desperate to pull his forces from the north.  
  
Olie’s wry laugh interrupted his thoughts.  “I guess that young Wendlyn prince must’ve whipped Terrasen into shape better than I would’ve expected.  Sounds like he’s got control of most of the old Bane.”  
  
“Who, Ashryver?”  Mikkal worked to keep his face neutral.  “That surprises me a bit, though perhaps it shouldn’t.”  
  
“Right, you trained him, didn’t you?”    
  
Mikkal nodded.  “He’s certainly talented enough, but I suppose I expected him to have to fight at least a couple of battles.”  
  
“Ah, well, he’ll have that chance next spring, if the rumors are right.  Oh, didn’t you hear about that?” In response to Mikkal’s unspoken question.  “Evidently there’s a large group of rebels that refused to fall in line when Ashryver gave them the chance.  Just before snow closed the mountains, Ashryver sent a letter asking what his orders are.  The King is going to order him to exterminate them as soon as the passes clear, or so I hear.”  
  
There was a pain in Mikkal’s chest like his old knife wound was reopening.  Aedion, having to kill his countrymen or be discovered.  What if he failed?  What if he succeeded?  With a supreme effort Mikkal leashed his panic and horror.  “That should be interesting, to see how he manages that.”  
  
Olie nodded.  “Yes, it should be a fair test of the bastard.”  He laughed again.  “I hear he’s quite pretty, I’m surprised you didn’t manage to pull him into your bed while you were training him.”  
  
Mikkal’s fingers twitched.  “I wouldn’t describe him as pretty, personally,” he said with false casualness.   Beautiful, maybe.  Overwhelming, definitely, but he of course couldn’t say that.  Somehow he made it out of there without making a fool of himself, or at least he thought he managed it, though he was pretty certain he’d agreed to meet up with Olie the next day.  The sun was already gone for the night, the city blooming out in lights, and he half-ran to Delaney’s bakery to meet her as her shift ended.  
  
She was startled to see him, even more so when he grabbed her arm and started walking.  “We need to see Fulke.  Now.”  
  
“What’s wrong?”  
  
Mikkal shook his head.  “Let’s go to Fulke’s.”  
  
Delaney planted her feet.  “Mikkal, we were just there two nights ago.  I’m supposed to meet Cherise.  You have to tell me what is so urgent it can’t wait.”  
  
As if summoned by her name, Cherise appeared at that moment.  Her startled expression turned quickly into a grin.  “Are you coming out with us tonight?” she asked.  “Fun!  I didn’t know you were into that.”  
  
Releasing Delaney’s arm, he took a couple steps backwards.  “I’ll go myself, don’t worry about it.”  
  
“Stop.”  The command in Delaney’s voice was impressive; not for the first time he thought that she would’ve made a good officer.  “You can’t just show up at Fulke’s, he probably has something going on.”  
  
“Fulke?” Cherise asked.  
  
“My cousin,” Delaney replied automatically.  She hadn’t looked away from Mikkal, so she missed the way Cherise’s eyes narrowed for a split second, but Mikkal did not.  “And he has parties most nights that I am most definitely not invited to, and neither are you,” that last directed at him.  
  
“I don’t care about whatever debauchery you think is going on,” he said, trying to keep his voice calm and mostly succeeding.  “I need to talk to him.”  
  
“I love debauchery,” Cherise said brightly.  “Why don’t we all go?”  
  
Delaney gave in with poor grace.  Mikkal bored holes into the back of Cherise’s head with his eyes as they walked.  He had liked her from the moment she had appeared at his apartment determined to help.  She was obviously good for Delaney and she was sweet to the girls.  Hell, once Avis had finished with her forced miscarriage she had set her up as an assistant to one of her nicer friends since Avis had refused Delaney’s suggestion to go to school.  But her reaction on hearing Fulke’s name made Mikkal’s gut tighten and he wanted to know why.  
  
They reached Fulke’s building and Cherise released Delaney’s arm to dash up the stairs.  Delaney looked at Mikkal in surprise, and his mouth tightened.  As they climbed after her, he found himself fingering his dagger.  
  
Just as they neared the top of the stairs, they heard Fulke exclaim, “Cherise!  I don’t recall inviting you to this particular party.”  Delaney practically jumped the last three steps and Fulke startled as he beheld her and a grim-faced Mikkal.  “And I certainly didn’t invite the two of you.”  He stepped into the hall and closed the door; despite the relatively early hour they could hear quite a number of people in the apartment over the strains of music.    
  
Cherise looped her arm through his and turned to Delaney and Mikkal.  “I’m just wondering how it is that I’ve been in love with your cousin for months now when I know for a fact you don’t have any surviving family, Fulke.  Is she lying, or are you?”  Her tone was mild, even cheerful; her gray eyes were anything but.  
  
Mikkal wished he had some way of capturing the expression on Fulke’s face for posterity.  He did resolve to write down some of the more creative curses that ensued to expand his own vocabulary.  “We can’t talk about this now.  No,” he said, when Cherise and Delaney both started to protest.  “I don’t know what the hell brought you three here tonight, but you, Cherise, know better than these two idiots who I have here.  Go.  Delaney, you can tell her whatever you want.  I’ll see you tomorrow.”  
  
“Fulke,” Mikkal said as he made to turn away.  “I have news that I’m not sure can wait.”  Fulke gave him a searching look, then beckoned to him.    
  
“We’ll be downstairs,” Delaney said, grabbing Cherise’s arm and dragging her with her.  
  
Fulke glanced anxiously at his door while Mikkal approached and dropped his mouth to his ear.  “I just found out that the King plans to send Aedion to destroy a group of rebels in the mountains as soon as the snow melts.  Evidently Aedion already attempted to assimilate them.  They should know that if they don’t surrender, they will be slaughtered.  Even if Aedion fails, which from what I hear about the soldiers he’s amassed is probably unlikely, the King will ensure their extermination.”  
  
Fulke stared at him in shock.  “How do you know this?”  
  
“You know better than to ask that.”  
  
 “Damnit.”  He sighed and pinched his nose for a moment.  “I’ll get a letter to Clery as soon as I can.”  
  
Mikkal nodded his thanks.  “Do I even want to know what’s going on in there?” he asked, gesturing to the door.  
  
“Absolutely not,” was Fulke’s reply, before he turned and walked through it.  Mikkal was left wondering if he had just helped Aedion, or killed him.  
  
*****  
  
Cherise was rigid as a board as Delany pulled her down the stairs, away from whatever military information Mikkal had needed to leak to Fulke.  Whatever it was, it couldn’t have been good, and Delaney felt a gnawing in her gut as she thought of Aedion and Raedan.  But they were a thousand miles away, and Cherise was right in front of her.  
  
“How do you know him?” Delaney hissed as they reached the bottom of the stairs.  
  
“I should be asking you that, but he’s right.  We can’t talk about this here.”  
  
They stood for a minute in awkward silence.  Delaney wanted to take her hand, to kiss her, but for a thousand reasons she couldn’t.  Mikkal clattered down the stairs before long and shoved through the door and out into the cold.  
  
A few tiny snowflakes were drifting in spirals as they followed him out onto the street.  Cherise raised her face to the sky and opened her mouth, catching the flakes on her tongue.  Delaney watched her, the way the streetlights highlighted her cheekbones, the tiny flecks of white that dotted her hair, and she swallowed against an ache in her throat.    
  
It was a silent walk back.  Delaney debated what to ask, what to say, but her mind was buzzing too violently to form a coherent plan.  Avis was home from work and Maida from school; of course they were, it was past time for their evening meal.  The girls had already eaten, judging by the dirty dishes on the counter.  Avis quickly read their expressions and leaped to her feet.  
  
“What’s wrong?” she demanded.  
  
“I honestly don’t know,” Delaney answered after a pause.  Avis glared at her, and Delaney gestured helplessly at the other two.  “Mikkal’s upset about something and Cherise…”  She didn’t know what to say about Cherise, who was glowering at her with arms folded tightly across her chest.  
  
“You don’t know.  Is that supposed to help you somehow?  Playing stupid?” Cherise growled.  Delaney had never heard her voice like that.  
  
“I’m not playing,” Delaney said, realizing too late that it made her sound like, well, an idiot.  Avis and Maida were looking between them, their eyes huge.     
  
“All right, then, tell me, how do you know Fulke?  And don’t give me any bullshit about being his cousin because I already know that’s a rutting lie.”  
  
“Uh…” Avis started, but stopped at Delaney’s look.  
  
“I…We grew up in a war camp, as you know,” Delaney said, gesturing to herself and her sisters.  Mikkal was watching her intently, and she wondered how much of all this he knew.  “I was forced to flee, for reasons I’m not going to get into right now.  I ended up in Terrasen, and met Fulke there.  When I decided to move back to Adarlan, he offered to help me if I helped him.”  She shrugged.  “It made more sense if we pretended to be related.”  
  
Cherise studied her through narrowed eyes.  “I’m pretty sure you’re leaving out everything important, but it’ll do for now.”  
  
“How do you know him?”  
  
Flopping into one of the chairs with an enormous sigh, Cherise let her head drop onto the back.  “Fulke’s father and my father were friends.  Before his family left, we spent a lot of time together.  He’s a lot older, obviously, so we were never really friends, but he was always around.”  
  
“You’ve got to be kidding me.”  Mikkal was gaping at her.  “You expect us to believe that you grew up with Fulke and you just happened to run into Delaney, and just happened to cultivate this relationship with her?”  
  
Cherise waved her hand dismissively.  “I don’t give a shit whether you believe it or not, it’s true.  I hadn’t seen Fulke in probably ten years until a few weeks ago.  You can ask him if you don’t believe me.  Then my father dragged me over there for dinner, you remember?  I told you I had to go eat with a childhood friend.”  
  
Delaney nodded slowly, remembering how irritated Cherise had been.  “But I’ve told you about him before.”  
  
“You told me about your ‘cousin,’ you never told me his name or we would’ve had this conversation a lot sooner.  I don’t like that you’re working with him.”  
  
“Why not?” Delaney bristled.  
  
“Because he’s an asshole who could get you killed,” Cherise snapped, leaning forward in her chair.  “I’m not saying what he does isn’t important, believe me.  I just…” She blew out a breath, glancing at Maida before continuing in a calmer voice.  “I hate thinking of you getting caught, is all.”  She looked at Mikkal.  “Are you working with him too?”  Mikkal just looked at her impassively.  “Because if so, if you get found out your execution will be mighty slow.”  
  
Maida was starting to tear up as she looked from Delaney to Mikkal.  “What’s going on?” she whispered to Avis, loud enough for everyone to hear.  
  
Delaney turned to her.  “I’m sorry, honey.  Umm.  Basically it’s what I just said, I’m helping someone who helped me, but it’s something that the King would not be happy about.  We’re not going to get caught, but I need you to not tell anybody.  Do you understand?”  
  
Maida nodded solemnly, and Avis put a protective arm around her.  “Are you seriously putting us at risk here?” she demanded, and Delaney was struck by how much Avis looked like her in that moment, with the firm set of her jaw and the flash of her green eyes.  
  
“I’ve been here, doing this, for well over a year now.  I don’t do anything dangerous.  All I do is go once a week to eat with him, but so does half the city as Cherise can no doubt verify.”  Cherise nodded reluctantly.  Delaney didn’t mention her regular letters to Clery; even Mikkal did not know about those.  
  
The five of them were silent, each caught up in their own thoughts.  It was Cherise who broke it, gesturing with her chin at Mikkal.  “I still want to know what got him all riled up.”  
  
He smiled his pretty smile at her.  “I’m afraid I have no idea what you’re talking about.”  
  
“Something made you insist we go there tonight, even though Delaney didn’t want to.”  
  
“I don’t know if you recall, but you in fact invited yourself.  I was more than happy to go alone.”  
  
“But why did you have to go at all?”  
  
“I wanted to see Fulke.”  
  
“You’re doing a fine job of dodging my question, Major.”  
  
“Thank you.”  
  
Delaney stifled a laugh.  Cherise’s outspokenness had no recourse against Mikkal’s polite stubbornness and she could watch this little battle play out all night, but she was hungry and had missed out on her chance to go out to dinner.  She said as much, and suddenly everyone was moving, heating up the leftover stew from the night before.    
  
When they were seated and eating, Cherise pointed her spoon at Delaney.  “We’re getting a larger apartment.  I’ll look tomorrow.”  Delaney stared at her in shock.  “It’s ridiculous that you’ve had the major sleeping on the couch for all these months.”  She turned to Mikkal.  “Do you want to keep this apartment, or do you want to move with us?  I need to know how big a place to get.”  
  
Mikkal’s mouth opened and closed silently a couple of times.  “I don’t want to leave the girls unprotected.”  
  
“Well, they won’t be either way, but I’ll take that as you want to move with us.  Good.  Fine.  I’ll get three rooms then.”  
  
Delaney found her voice.  “Wait, wait, I doubt we can afford whatever you’re planning.”  
  
Cherise shrugged.  “I can.”  
  
“So what, you’re moving in with us?” Avis asked.  
  
“Of course!  How else can I make sure your sister and the major don’t get everyone killed?  Besides,” she went on, turning to Delaney, “I have better contacts than you anyway, and nobody thinks I’m capable of doing anything other than spending money.  I can aid your cause, or whatever.”  
  
“Why?” Delaney asked.  She felt like the ground had dropped out from underneath her when Mikkal had shown up outside the bakery and she was still falling.  
  
Cherise abruptly turned serious.  “Did you never wonder where my mother is?”  
  
“I assumed she had died.  I didn’t want to ask.”  
  
“She’s alive.  She’s in Wendlyn.  She fled when I was four.  She wanted to take me, but my father wouldn’t let her.”  
  
“She had magic.”  Mikkal wasn’t asking, and Cherise nodded.  “Do you have it too?”  
  
She grinned.  “That’s an excellent question, isn’t it?”  
  
“How many magic-wielders are there in the city?” he asked, more to himself but she answered anyway.  
  
“Far more than you’d think.  Mostly younger generation, though, the older ones are dead or gone.”  She cocked her head.  “Do you have it?”  He shook his head.  “Then why do you give a shit?  Why risk your life?”  
  
“It’s my choice, is it not?  Does the reason matter?”  
  
“Yes, if you want me to trust you.”  
  
Delaney watched an array of emotions cross his face as he decided how to answer.  “I know too many citizens of conquered lands to think that what Adarlan is doing is right.”  
  
She accepted that with a nod.  “Noble sentiment.  I suppose I should’ve known that a soldier with that pretty a face can’t be a brute.”  
  
He snorted.  “If you judge men by that, you’ll get yourself raped or killed sooner than later.”  
  
“I was joking.”  
  
“I know, but these girls might not.”  
  
Cherise stood abruptly and walked over to him, bending to plant a kiss on his cheek.  He looked startled, but not displeased.  She continued down the hall towards the bathing room, and Mikkal looked at Delaney.  “What just happened?”  
  
“I’m…not really sure, to be honest.”  She stood and followed Cherise, pushing through the door just as it closed.  
  
Cherise cocked an eyebrow at her.  “I love you, darling, but I’m not sure we’re ready to pee together.”  
  
“But we’re moving in together.”  Cherise nodded.  “Why?”  
  
“Didn’t I just say it?  I love you, and I think you’re fond of me.  If you’re going to get yourself killed, I want to spend as much time with you beforehand as possible.”  
  
“Oh.”  Delaney wanted to say more, something profound and poetic and memorable, but her brain had frozen on the tender expression in Cherise’s gray eyes, on her broad mouth and the strong bones of her face.  There was nothing soft about this tall woman in front of her, except her heart, and she loved every sharp corner of her.  As Cherise bent to take her mouth with her own, she realized that this was home.  Not this apartment, but this woman, this feeling, this moment.  
  
*****  
  
Aedion waited impatiently at the armory.  Conor had made him a nearly perfect sword, but kept refusing to give it to him, always having to tweak something.  Dozens of other soldiers had received new swords in the meantime; he didn’t know why he couldn’t get his.  Sure, he needed one longer and heavier than the rest, but he’d been happy with it a month ago and he wanted to get familiar with it.  He needed it to be an extension of his arm, something he didn’t even have to think about, and at this rate he’d be stuck going into battle with the shitty unbalanced one he’d been dealing with since the summer.  
  
He stared out at the driving snow.  For weeks now the snow had been accumulating, a few inches here, a few more there, even the bright sunny days rarely getting warm enough to melt any.  But this was clearly more, and all he could do was try to calculate how much farther it was going to set them back.  
  
Conor emerged then, holding the sword in a beautifully carved scabbard.  Aedion took it from him reverently, studying the birds that played over the rich leather casing.  Swallows and meadowlarks.  He glanced up at Conor but could read nothing in those steady eyes.  In one smooth motion, he unsheathed the sword.  
  
It was perfect.  Not just almost perfect, but absolutely perfect.  The shape of the grip had been slightly altered, and wrapped in soft goatskin so as not to slip.  The curve of the guard had been broadened, so he could spin it without risking his knuckles.  The blade itself had needed no adjustment, and it gleamed now as if reflecting an inner light.  He spun it again and studied the pommel.  Previously it had been a plain round ball, just a counterweight to balance the blade.  It was unchanged except for a wolf’s head that had been meticulously etched into the dark metal.  
  
“Damn,” he said softly, completely awed by the artistry, by the love that had gone into this creation.  
  
“Captain Rosach had a little input,” Conor said.  “I hope that’s all right.”  
  
“It’s more than all right.  Conor, this is stunning.  I can’t thank you enough.”  He pulled the blacksmith into a one-armed hug.  “Your father would be so proud of you.”  
  
Pride shone in Conor’s face as he stepped back once released.  “Thank you, sir.  It’s a honor.”  
  
Aedion shook his head as he buckled on the scabbard.  “The honor is mine, to bear such a weapon.  Only the Sword of Orynth could mean as much to me as this.”  
  
Conor bowed.  “May it serve you well, Prince.  May we all serve you well.”  
  
Aedion’s heart stopped.  He returned the bow and left the armory but he wasn’t really aware of where he was headed.  Eventually he found himself at the stables, watching the horses who could have been in the large barn but were choosing to stand outside with their backs to the pelting snow and their heads all under the overhang.  He could hear the hissing whisper of the snowflakes against his hood and squeezed his eyes closed.  
  
They were serving him.  Him, not the King of Adarlan, nor the memory of Terrasen’s dead kings.  All these men, these brave wonderful men, were turning their lives over to him to play with as chess pieces.  Pain cracked through him, followed by flames.  How could they be so careless?  How could he be so careless, as to think he could ever do this?  He was nothing but a name in a body, he had no right to ask this of anyone.  He brushed away the ice crystals forming in his eyelashes and turned towards the house.  
  
*****  
  
Cathal looked up from where he was building the fire to see Aedion closing the door a little too emphatically.  It had been snowing all day and instead of petering out the flakes were falling faster, the wind beginning to whip them past the windows.  It had all the making of a real blizzard, something they had more or less escaped so far this winter, and evidently Aedion was not happy about it.    
  
He turned his attention back to the fireplace, finishing his stack and lighting a match.  The dry twigs caught, and he watched as the flames began to lick up onto the larger logs, charring the remnants of bark that clung to them.  Aedion was making far more noise than necessary knocking the snow off his boots and then taking them off, but Cathal was pretty certain the mini tantrum would be over with as soon as he shoved some food at him.  There was soup that Brydie had left on the stovetop that should do the job.  
  
Socked feet padded over to him and he stood just as Aedion reached him, stepping back so Aedion’s chest bumped him and leaning in as strong arms wrapped around his waist.  He felt lips brush the side of his neck, then Aedion murmured in his ear, “I hate this rutting snow.”  
  
He grinned as he turned to meet Aedion’s lips, licking them lightly before pulling back to say.  “Come on, now, it’s not so bad.  We’ll have an excuse to stay in our room as long as we want.”    
  
But Aedion’s whole body was rigid next to him, had been from the moment they’d touched.  “We’re not ready.  We’re not ready to meet Millar, and we can’t get ready when we’re buried under six feet of snow.”  
  
“We’re ready, Aedion.  You were on the outskirts of this before, but trust me, we’re ready.”  
  
Aedion shook his head and released him, spinning to pace around the room.  “People are going to die, Cathal.  People are going to die because I’m not ready.”  
  
“Because you’re not ready, or we’re not ready?”  Aedion waved a hand dismissively.  Cathal went on sharply, “There’s a huge difference between the two and you know it.  Yes, if it comes to a battle people will die, Aedion, but it’s not because of you.”  
  
Aedion snorted from where he was leaning against the mantle, staring at the fire.  “That is such bullshit and you know it.”  
  
Cathal ran through the past couple of days in his mind, but nothing stood out to have set Aedion off.  Actually over the previous month they had gotten indoor practice down pretty well, and last week a few of the regulars had gone around and set up archery targets in places around camp above the snow line.  “What’s this about, really?”  
  
“What if it’s you?”  Aedion turned to face him, and his eyes were too old and so, so young all at once.  “What if there’s something I’m not thinking of, and I’ve gambled with your life, and it’s you who dies?”  
  
One long stride closed the distance, and he raised his hand to Aedion’s face.  “I need you to hear me now,” he said with quiet intensity.  “Do not diminish my choice here.  I chose to follow you because I believe you are the best chance to help Terrasen.  I made that choice.  And if I lose my life to help my country… well, I signed up for that long before I ever met you.  We all did.”  He stood up on his toes to brush his lips against Aedion’s unresponsive mouth.  “It’s not all about you, you arrogant bastard.”  
  
Aedion snorted, and then reluctantly started to laugh.  Finally his posture softened and he reached up to brush Cathal’s hair off his forehead.  “I’m not sure I can bear this,” he whispered.    
  
“You can, Aedion.  You can, and you will.”    
  
Abruptly Aedion’s mouth was on his, and he was pushed back until his knees hit the couch.  “Not here,” he murmured, and Aedion growled in response, his hands tearing into Cathal’s clothes.  “Aedion…”  
  
“I need you, Cathal.”  He barely sounded human, and Cathal found himself stirring in response.  
  
“Same,” he gasped, “but not here.”  Pulling away, he grabbed Aedion’s hand and led him up the stairs.  They didn’t make it to the bed; as soon as the door was closed Cathal dropped to his knees, needing to taste him, to feel those broad fingers in his hair, to hear his rough breathing.  Aedion had barely finished when he turned the tables, pushing Cathal down on the floor, not gentle as he stripped him.  He bit Cathal’s shoulder, hard enough that he cried out in surprise that quickly turned into pleasure as Aedion worked him.  There was something about being held at that fixed point, about the threat of pain that didn’t really hurt, that made the release even more overwhelming.  Cathal could barely remember his own name when Aedion shifted his mouth to his own, and they lay on the floor, swallowing each other’s panting breaths, until they heard the door open downstairs and the muttering of indistinct voices.  
  
He pushed himself up on his elbows, and Aedion rolled off of him.  “I’m going to get you some food,” he said.  
  
“I can get it myself,” Aedion replied.  
  
“I know.”  Cathal stood and pulled his clothes back on, relieved that they weren’t damaged.  He didn’t think he had anything else that was clean.    
  
Leaving Aedion still on the floor, he went downstairs and greeted the others.  None of them commented on his appearance, though he was certain his hair was still roughed up, his face still flushed, that he smelled like sex.  He went to the stovetop and spooned some of the soup into a large bowl, thanking Brydie over his shoulder for making it.    
  
“Did you not eat lunch?” she asked, cocking her head in concern.  
  
“No, no, I did.  This is for Aedion.”  She nodded and grabbed a small crusty loaf and an apple, then pulled some cheese out and began slicing it.  Stacking it all on a tray, she took the bowl from his hands and placed it next to the other food, then rummaged in a drawer for a spoon.  He gave her a quick kiss on the cheek in thanks and she rewarded him with her sweet smile.  
  
On his way past where Grant and Dewa were sitting in front of the fire, he paused, setting the tray down on the low table.  “I need you to talk to Aedion at some point,” he said, as quietly as he could, knowing it was still possible Aedion would hear him.  They looked at him with identical expressions of concern.  “He’s struggling with asking people to fight for him.”  
  
They both nodded understanding, but to his surprise it was Dewar, not Grant, who replied, “Yes, I can imagine that is hard for someone like him.”  
  
“What do you mean?”    
  
Cathal’s question was curious not defensive, and Dewar’s face was uncharacteristically compassionate when he replied, “Ashryver hates to ask anything of anybody else.  He has this idea that it’s always his job to take all the risk.  And as mature as he seems, he’s awfully young.”  
  
“Don’t forget,” Grant added, “he was raised to be a weapon and a shield.”  
  
Cathal had forgotten that, or had never thought of it.  When he had first come to Orynth, a long time ago when he was perhaps Aedion’s age himself, he had stood in a line with his fellow soldiers and saluted the royal family as they rode by.  It was the first time he had seen Aedion, the young prince riding next to the princess on her pony, his face unnaturally serious for a boy.  Cathal had actually not even realized until that moment that it had been Aedion all those years ago.  Somehow it had seemed to be somebody else, someone distant and untouchable.  It was easy to think of the prince living in that beautiful palace, surrounded by family who must have adored him, and believe he would have been coddled.  But no; he had been brought from Wendlyn as a child to take the blood oath to his infant cousin. He wondered if Aedion had ever really been treated as a family member, or if Grant, who had known Rhoe Galathynius well, was right in his assessment.  A weapon and a shield indeed; and now that Aelin Galathynius was dead, he was trying to serve as one for the whole country.  
  
*****  
  
Aedion watched Cathal reading on his bed, limbs loose, carved face relaxed.  He couldn’t see the bruise he’d bitten into that broad shoulder, but he liked knowing it was there.  Tossing his apple core into the waste basket under his desk, he crawled onto the bed next to Cathal, whose lips quirked up slightly though his eyes didn’t veer from his pages.  
  
“Can I ask you something without sounding like an asshole?”  
  
Cathal dropped the book on the bed next to him.  “I doubt it, but give it a try.”  
  
“How did you learn to read?”  Aedion had been wondering for a long time, but had been worried the question made him sound like an elitist prick.    
  
“My grandmother taught me,” he said, smiling faintly, either at Aedion or the memory.  Aedion tried to dredge up what he knew of Cathal’s childhood, but all he could recall was that he had grown up on the streets in Rosamel.  Cathal went on.  “She died when I was about six, I think.  I used to go to the library a lot after that.  It was warm, you see.  I’d follow another family in, and as long as I was quiet I could stay there all day.”  
  
Aedion cursed under his breath, then surged up to kiss him.  Behind his closed lids he could see tiny Cathal, dark eyes hollow, face robbed of any childish curves by hunger, sitting between unforgotten stacks with a book in his lap.  Meanwhile the adult Cathal dug strong fingers into his arms, silently demanding that he shed the pity.  Aedion rolled onto his back, dragging Cathal with him, relishing the weight pressing into him, the solid reality of him.  
  
Cathal let his head fall onto Aedion’s shoulder.  They lay like that for a long time, listening to the crackling of the fire Cathal had built in the room, the muted voices of the others downstairs.  Aedion’s hands rubbed up and down Cathal’s back of their own accord as his thoughts began to spiral.  
  
“I don’t understand the point of it,” Aedion said abruptly, and Cathal pushed up enough to look him in the face.    
  
“The point of what?” Cathal asked when Aedion didn’t continue.  
  
He considered how to say what he was thinking.  It was a truth Cathal had asked for weeks ago, and he didn’t know why it needed to be said here, now, but it did.  “Why seek pleasure from something so painful?” he finally asked.  
  
It took a long time for Cathal to put the pieces together, and the agony in his face when he finally did was hard to look at.  He pushed up onto his knees, straddling Aedion’s thighs, and it was a shock how cold Aedion suddenly felt.  “It doesn’t have to hurt, Aedion,” he said quietly, his voice strained.  “It shouldn’t hurt, not like…not like what you’re thinking.  Sore at first, maybe,” he admitted, touching the spot where Aedion had left the bruise not an hour before, “rather like this.  But not painful.  And a lot of the time the climax is more intense.”  He watched him, and Aedion wondered what his face was showing when he saw Cathal’s nostrils flare.  “Are you telling me that he never explained this to you?”  There was a muscle flickering in his jaw.   
  
Aedion’s brow furrowed.  “Don’t be angry with Mikkal, he did nothing wrong.”  
  
“You’re right,” Cathal said, somehow managing to withdraw without moving.  “I have no right to judge this.”  It was obvious that he was in fact judging, though, and Aedion waited.  “It’s just…he knew, right?”  Aedion nodded.  “And he didn’t explain.  He had to know what you would think.  He had to know that you’d believe that you were hurting the man that you loved.”  
  
Aedion rubbed his hand over his face, abruptly exhausted, not wanting to explain about Mikkal, about his gentle reticence that stemmed from a deep and quiet understanding.  “Why is everything always so difficult with you?”  He regretted the words as soon as he’d said them, knew he’d unintentionally struck too deep when he saw the stone mask settle over Cathal’s face.  It was the same one he’d worn when they’d met at Clery’s all those months ago, and it felt like he was looking at a stranger.    
  
Those dark eyes flicked down, then back to Aedion’s.  “Yeah.  Well.”  
  
“Cathal…”  
  
“If you figure it out, tell Dewar.  Clery too, he’s been wondering that for years.”  Aedion expected him to get up, but he remained there, inches and miles away, seeming to read Aedion’s mind.  “If you want me to go, you’ll have to tell me.”  His lips quirked up but only a fool would call it a smile.    
  
Aedion sat up; they were nose to nose, and Cathal didn’t blink, didn’t pull back.  “Why the hell would I want you to go?” Aedion growled.  Cathal grabbed his shirt and pulled him in for a kiss.    
  
It should’ve been harsh, but it wasn’t.  It was tentative and sweet, and Aedion was the one to deepen it, licking his way into Cathal’s mouth.  The resulting sharp intake of breath threatened to undo what little control he had left and his hand tightened spasmodically on Cathal’s thigh.  Cathal broke the kiss but he didn’t go far, dropping his head to press against Aedion’s neck.  
  
“The thing is,” Cathal murmured, and then stopped.  “The thing is, that I’m in love with you.  I have been for a long time now.  And I don’t deserve to say that to you, but it’s true.”  
  
Aedion was honestly confused.  This wasn’t any kind of revelation, not to him; he thought they had been saying this to each other with every kiss, every playful argument, every time they nestled closer to each other in the dark.  He really thought it had been clear after Cathal had put three men in the healer’s ward a month ago.  It only left one question.  “Why the hell do you think you don’t deserve that?”   He wanted to look at Cathal’s face, but couldn’t see it where he was frozen against his neck.  “Cathal.  Really.”  Carefully extricating himself, he managed to cup Cathal’s jaw in his hands and forced him to meet his eyes.  “Did you not know?  I didn’t think it needed to be said.”  
  
Cathal drew a shuddering breath, closing his eyes.  “I can’t…I don’t…”    
  
There was moisture gathering in his eyelashes, and Aedion brushed it away with his lips.  Tugging at the neck of Cathal’s shirt, he kissed the bite mark on his shoulder.  “I love you,” he whispered, and somehow the words he’d thought a thousand times sounded different spoken, sounded more like their shared breaths than words.  He whispered it again as he kissed Cathal’s neck, and a third time against the rough skin of his jaw, and the words tasted of copper and salt.  And when Cathal finally stirred, moving to take Aedion’s mouth with his own with a fierce and desperate need, Aedion wondered what it would be like to let him in.  
  
When they finally paused, tangled up fully clothed and both hard, he asked quietly, “Do you want me to fuck you?”  
  
Cathal growled as he gently nipped his jaw.  “No.”  He pushed up on his elbows to more easily meet Aedion’s eyes.  “I told you weeks ago, I’m more than content with the way we make love. But I’m not all right with you doing something that you don’t understand just because you think you have to please me.”    
  
“What if I want to?”  
  
“Not until you’re not afraid of hurting me.”  He laced his fingers through Aedion’s.  “We’ll work up to it, I promise.”    
  
Aedion dragged him down for a kiss, rolling his hips against Cathal’s body and earning a soft moan.  Cathal slipped a hand between them, under his waistband, brushing the tip of him lightly, teasingly.  “You never answered my question, you know,” Aedion reminded him, even as he pushed himself harder into Cathal’s hand.  “Why don’t you think you deserve this?”    
  
Cathal’s taunting fingers stilled, and the fond exasperation on his face would’ve made Aedion grin if the question hadn’t been so serious.  “I’m a bastard street rat, Aedion, and you’re…you.”  
  
“I’m also a bastard,” Aedion reminded him.  
  
Cathal snorted.  “I think anyone would tell you it’s a very different thing to be a bastard prince.  You’re probably the only person who doesn’t see why I shouldn’t be allowed the same room as you, let alone in your bed.”  
  
“See, now, that doesn’t even make sense to me.”  
  
“I was a thief, Aedion.  I only joined the Bane because it beat going to prison.  And on top of that I went mad for three months, enough so that it’s all anyone remembers when they hear my name.”  
  
“And now you’re a captain who spent more than two years working for Clery, risking your life getting innocent people to safety.”  Aedion waved his hand expansively while he struggled to find the right words.  “The thing is, it’s not about where you’re born or who your parents are or, I don’t know, how many chances you’re given.  That’s not what makes someone worth something, it’s usually beyond your control.  It’s…it’s about what you do with the chances you get.  And on that score?  I’m the one who should be grateful to have you in my bed, not the other way around.”  
  
Cathal stared at him for a long moment.  “You are such an idealist,” he finally said, and Aedion laughed.    
  
“Is that a bad thing?”  
  
“Not to me.”    
  
Aedion reached for him, sliding his hands under his shirt, savoring the feel of his solid body.  “We’re stuck here until the snow stops, we might as well entertain each other.”  
  
Cathal kissed him slowly, lingeringly.  “Now do you understand why I don’t mind blizzards?”  
  
“I’m figuring it out.”    
  
*****  
  
Mikkal stood at the river’s edge, looking north.  His view was blocked by buildings and the city walls, but he felt like he could see past them all to the rolling hills of northern Adarlan, up to the Staghorn mountains he had fought in long ago.  To Aedion, where he was readying the men of Terrasen to fight against their countrymen.  
  
Spring was coming to Rifthold; in another few weeks it would creep north, over those rugged mountains.  Fulke had told him last night that Clery thought a fight was inevitable.  The leader of the rebels would not back down, he had said, and Aedion could not.    
  
He didn’t doubt Aedion’s ability to fight, nor to win.  But he didn’t know how much that proud spirit would have to break to do so.  “I can’t do this anymore,” he said aloud to the river.  “I can’t live my life for him anymore.”  The water murmured an answer he couldn’t understand.  
  
*****  
  
It had taken a month for Aedion to get used to feeling Cathal’s hands on his ass, for the sensation of being held to shoot desire through him instead of panic.  Another month for him to get comfortable with the idea of having his fingers inside Cathal as he would have them in a woman, not just as a means to ready him for his cock, but as a source of pleasure all their own.  But now it was becoming…fun.  Perhaps because he was amply rewarded by the sight of Cathal arching in front of him, each minute twitch of his fingers drawing out a moan that could probably be heard at the mess hall.    
  
Taking him into his mouth, he almost laughed at Cathal’s fruitless attempts to stifle the groan that resulted.  He loved seeing Cathal like this, loved being the reason for it even more.  When Cathal’s climax wracked him and left him a boneless puddle, Aedion kissed his way up his body, grinning to himself at the little twitches each brush of his lips elicited on oversensitive skin.    
  
“Holy gods,” Cathal said when Aedion reached his face, sounding dazed.  Or drunk.    
  
Aedion propped himself up on his side, achingly hard, and rested his free hand on Cathal’s abdomen.  “Would you be willing to do that for me?” he asked quietly.   
  
“Of course,” Cathal said, his eyes sliding to Aedion’s.    
  
“Now?”  
  
“Well, I can’t feel my arms right now but as soon as that changes, yes.”  
  
It didn’t take long before Cathal managed to roll himself over to meet Aedion’s lips.  A few minutes more, and he pushed Aedion flat onto his back without breaking the kiss.  Lips, teeth, and tongue marked a trail down Aedion’s neck over his shoulder, then down his chest and abdomen.  Cathal kneeling between his legs was a familiar sight by now, but Aedion still found himself tensing up a little.  “Do you trust me?” Cathal asked, his gravel rasp even more pronounced than normal as he picked up the little bottle of oil that lay near his calf.  
  
“Yes.”  
  
“Do you remember when you first did this for me?”  Aedion nodded.  “If you can, talk to me.  What works for me might not for you.  And I promise, if you tell me to stop, I will stop.”  
  
“I know.”  And he did.    
  
Cathal returned his attention to Aedion’s skin, to the soft bites that he knew drove him crazy.  When Aedion was aching again Cathal drew him into his mouth, and Aedion reached down to touch his scalp as he always did.  He could feel Cathal’s other hand against his ass but that had become familiar too, and though something tightened in his gut it wasn’t fear.  Cathal’s mouth was light, playful; maintaining his arousal but not pushing him further.  As he started to long for more he felt something - Cathal’s finger - ease into him.  Not pain, but stretching.  It was odd but not exactly unpleasant, having his attention split between being inside Cathal’s mouth and having Cathal inside him.  A distant part of his mind wanted to panic, but he tangled his fingers tighter into Cathal’s hair and that part receded.    
  
The slow, subtle movement within him became less of an intrusion.  Rather abruptly he felt an intense bolt of pleasure, as if he was about to climax; at his barked curse Cathal froze.  Aedion managed to gasp out, “Don’t…don’t stop.”  Cathal’s mouth on him intensified, and so did the tingling pressure deep in his body.  He didn’t know how long it went on for, but it felt like forever that he teetered on the brink.  When his release finally came his whole body spasmed with it, leaving him trembling and nearly incoherent afterwards.    
  
Awareness trickled back in.  Cathal was lying next to him, not touching him, just watching with no particular expression on his face.  Aedion reached for him, vaguely surprised by how feeble his movement was.  Cathal was gentle as he leaned down to kiss him, but Aedion didn’t want gentle.  As soon as he could move more definitively, he surged, pinning Cathal beneath him.  
  
When they paused for breath, Cathal murmured, “That was all right then?”    
  
Aedion gave a dark laugh.  “I never could have imagined it would feel like that.”  Cathal’s smile was small, quiet, but there was triumph in his eyes.  “Don’t look so smug,” Aedion said, grinning.  
  
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”  The smile broadened as he pulled Aedion down.  “I love you,” he murmured.  
  
“I love you too.”  It should have been familiar by then, but it wasn’t.  Aedion still felt an unexpected thrill every time they said the words.  He wondered if it would ever become rote.  Would that even be a bad thing?  To be able to love someone for long enough to become a habit?  At the moment that concept seemed impossible, and he shoved it from his mind.  Hope was too dangerous right now.  
  
The next morning as he was waking Cathal up with soft kisses, he heard a titmouse singing somewhere nearby.  Cathal must have heard it too; he turned his head to listen, then whispered, “Spring is almost here.”  
  
Spring, and the anniversary of Aelin’s death, of Adarlan’s invasion, of Orlon’s and Rhoe’s and Evalin’s assassinations.  Spring, and with it Millar.  There was a flutter of something like fear in Aedion’s chest, and he tried unsuccessfully to quiet it.  I can’t handle losing you, Aedion thought as he cupped Cathal’s face in his hands.  He hadn’t said it aloud, but he could see the recognition in those dark eyes that told him Cathal heard him anyway.  But there were no false promises from Cathal, no worthless guarantees.  Just a kiss he felt deep in his bones, that allowed the endless courage of this man he loved to flow through and into him. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> All comments and feedback are appreciated!


	23. Chapter 23

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter covers 2 days in Terrasen. It's a little NSFW and there's some canon-typical violence.

Aedion sat on his horse on the ridge, looking down at the dots of tents below him.  By some miracle they had made it through to this site on the westernmost margin of the Allsbrook lands, north of Rosamel, without incident.  Well, without injury.  Several fresh ghost leopard skins were currently spread out to dry, prizes won over the past week by his soldiers being quick with their bows.  He and Cathal had each bagged one, and had engaged in a friendly argument for most of a day as to whose was bigger (Cathal’s, but he wouldn’t tell him that).    
  
Kemp’s family managed the land they were on.  They had been storing and drying food all winter to help feed the soldiers after Kemp had told them about Millar’s rejection of their overtures.  He couldn’t see their house from here; another ridge barred his view.  In the other direction, trees blocked the village that lay between here and Millar’s camp.  He, Grant, Kemp, and Gillies had just returned from there, having found a page to bring a letter to Millar, requesting a meeting, and return with the colonel’s response.  
  
There was movement below him, like large insects weaving through the dots, pausing next to smaller insects.  No doubt Grant, Kemp, and Gillies talking to Dewar and Cathal and probably Raedan, though he couldn’t identify them from where he sat.  They all seemed so far away but he didn’t ride down; it was easier to think up here.  
  
Grant had the letter with Millar’s response.  It had been succinct:  “Traitor Prince: May Hellas take you.  There shall be no negotiations.”  At least he hadn’t killed the page.  
  
On the way back, Aedion had told the men to double the perimeter patrol, and use buglers in case of a night attack.  It was like a seismic shift in his brain, every piece of defensive strategy brought to the forefront.  Now, up on the ridge, watching the fires being lit, a different shift was occurring.  Suddenly, he was calm.  Not peaceful; no, this was the calm of deep, certain rage. The painful unease he had felt for months was gone.  These were his men down there, and he would not let them fall.  
  
A couple of the insects were heading in his direction, so he clucked to Marcra and they began picking their way down the steep slope.  As he got closer, the insects enlarged into Cathal and Raedan, as he had expected; both looked grim, also expected.  Cathal searched his face, and he saw his same calm settle on those beloved features.  He swung a leg over Marcra’s back and dropped to the ground.  
  
“Millar’s a fool,” Cathal said, and Raedan nodded earnestly.    
  
“So it would seem,” Aedion replied.  Cathal led him towards the tent he had put up for them, and Aedion picketed Marcra and untacked him.  The three of them grabbed food and gathered around one of the fires with some of the other men, who went silent when they saw who had arrived.  Aedion waved a hand at them in encouragement, and after a few awkward moments one of the men resumed his story hesitantly.  Aedion recognized the tale; it had been Quinn’s favorite, and he started to grin.  
  
“So this fae warrior, right, he snaps a leg off the table and impales the man with it.  Can you imagine?”  
  
“That is such a lie,” one of the others scoffs.  “There is no way anyone could kill someone with a table leg, except with a lucky blow to the head.”  
  
Aedion spoke up.  “No, it’s true.”  Everyone gaped at him except Raedan, who true to form just started to laugh.  “But you’re not talking about any fae warrior, you’re talking about Rowan Whitethorn.  One of Queen Maeve’s most trusted warriors, and probably the most powerful fae male in history, right?”  There was some dumbfounded nodding and Aedion put his plate on the ground so he could gesture with his hands.  “And I think he’d been injured, too, but maybe that’s a different story.  Anyway, he’d been stripped of all his weapons and clapped in iron so he couldn’t use his magic, so what does he do?  He breaks the leg off the table,” Aedion mimed the action, “and you know wood can get pretty sharp when it’s broken, so he takes the broken end and just jabs it right through the man’s stomach, so hard it ends up embedded in the stone wall behind him.”  
  
“I still don’t believe it!” the soldier insisted.  “These things always get exaggerated.”  
  
“You could be right,” Aedion shrugged, “but that’s the way one of my uncle’s men always told it.”  
  
“I bet you could do it,” someone said from the far side of the fire.  Aedion grinned and waved his hand dismissively.  “No, seriously,” the man, Linton, said.  “Can we test it?”  
  
“Well, I’m not killing anyone here, I like you all too much.”  Everyone laughed.  “Besides, I might be big but I’m not exactly built like a fae warrior.”  
  
“You’re still young,” Cathal said thoughtfully at his side, and Aedion looked at him, surprised he was speaking up.  “Probably another ten years though and you could give any of them a run for their money.  Even the legendary Rowan Whitethorn.”  
  
Raedan got up and disappeared towards the trees.  Aedion had assumed he was going to take a piss, but he returned with a branch off an oak tree just as Aedion was finishing his food.  “This is about the thickness of a table leg,” he said, hefting it in his hands.  “And it’s not rotten, it looks like lightning took it down recently.”  Indeed, one end was split and charred, but the wood felt solid and heavy when Aedion took it.  He observed the expressions of the men gathered around him, and every one of them wore an identical mix of awe and skepticism.  Standing, he eyed the length of branch, then snapped it off about three feet from the end.    
  
With a fierce grin, he turned and strode through camp, his little gathering scrambling to follow him.  They collected more people as they went, and he wandered along the edge of the woods until he spotted an enormous beech tree.  “Well, I don’t have a body, and I don’t have a stone wall, but let’s see how I can do here.”  Closing his eyes briefly, he grounded himself, finding the strong stable place in his core where the lava of his anger was simmering, then with a deep breath he opened his eyes and lunged, driving the branch before him.  There was a loud crunching noise, and shocking reverberation through his branch.  He released it and looked behind him at the sudden silence.  Fifty men stood staring at him, at the tree, their mouths gaping open.  He looked back at the tree.  About a foot and a half of branch still quivered in front of him; the rest had been driven straight through the trunk.  
  
“I take it back,” said the original skeptic shakily.  “You could definitely kill someone with a table leg.”  Everyone backed away as he headed towards them, and there was quiet muttering in his wake.  Cathal and Raedan followed him, both laughing immoderately, Raedan clapping him on the shoulders.    
  
“Brilliant!”  Raedan was bubbling over.  “Absolutely amazing.”  Aedion looked at him flatly; the reaction he’d gotten from the men had been more fear than anything else, and that hadn’t been his intention.  “Seriously, Aedion, you just put yourself in the same category as a fae warrior these men grew up hearing stories of.  Everybody here is going to brag for the rest of their lives that they watched you do that.  They’re all thanking their lucky stars that they’re on your side.”  
  
“He’s right,” Cathal said. “You have no idea how unbelievable that was to watch.”  He studied Aedion’s face for a second.  “Come on.  Sit back down at the fire, they’ll come around.”  
  
Surprisingly, Cathal was right.  It took a few minutes, but pretty soon the crowd around their fire was triple what it had been.  Stories and jokes flew fast and furious, Aedion participating with everyone else.  A runner came in, heading straight for Aedion.  “Sir, Millar’s camp is gathering, they’re readying for battle.  According to Ellis, they should be ready to march in the morning.”  There was a long pause, and Aedion got heavily to his feet.  
  
“Warriors!” he yelled, and his voice carried far in the damp spring air.  The whole camp site quieted.  “Colonel Millar has rejected our offer to unite the Bane.  His men ready for battle.  We march at dawn!”  A beat of silence, then an eruption of cheers and shouts and beating of shields.  There was singing and laughter; the atmosphere light, almost joyful.  It struck Aedion as odd.  
  
He said as much to Cathal when they retreated to their tent.  Cathal looked thoughtful as he stripped off his shirt, then bent to unlace his boots.  Aedion sat on his bedroll to do the same.  “It seems pretty normal to me, really,” Cathal said, joining Aedion on his bedroll.  “We can’t change anything about tomorrow, so we might as well enjoy tonight.  I used to have a man under my command who brought his fiddle to every battle site.  He’d play long into the night, dances and ballads and light happy songs.  I loved it.  Then after the battle was over, he’d cry for an hour, then play again.”    
  
Aedion kissed him in reply, somehow hearing the faint playing of music though he knew there was none.  Not fiddle, but harp, vibrating up through the soles of his feet.  Cathal undid both bedrolls, joining them back to each other so they could share.  They kissed with fierce intensity, though their hands on each other were more gentle, drawing pleasure out slowly.  At Cathal’s first hitch of breath, Aedion whispered in his ear, “Can I fuck you?”  
  
“Not tonight,” Cathal murmured, upping the tempo of his hand slightly until Aedion was the one breathing harder.  
  
Aedion didn’t want to voice that they might not have another chance.  “When, then?” he demanded in another whisper.  
  
“After tomorrow.”  
  
“Are you trying to bribe me into surviving with fucking?”  
  
“Consider it incentive.”  There was a smile in his quiet voice, and Aedion remembered his own words to Cathal last fall, the first time they’d kissed before Cathal had gone to Millar’s.  He huffed a laugh, until his attention was drawn back to what their hands were doing and he let go of his mind altogether.  
  
*****  
  
Cathal sat on his horse, a hundred yards and a hundred men separating him from Aedion. The prince was silent as he looked down the ridge at the rock-strewn valley that sat between them and Millar’s forces. Grant was on Aedion’s far side, invisible to Cathal; the other officers were dotted among the men spread out behind them. The quiet was oppressive, even the occasional stamping of a hoof or shifting of a weapon seeming muffled.  
  
Dragging his attention to the far side of the valley, Cathal could make out the mass of soldiers that crowded that gentler slope. Neither group had the high ground; meeting in the middle was inevitable; but Millar’s group would have the easier area to defend. Yet from what he could see, it appeared his side outnumbered Millar’s by close to two to one. He looked at Aedion again; even from this distance he could feel the calm fury radiating from him, as it had since the previous night.  Aedion, sitting there on a horse so ugly it should be illegal, in plain armor that didn’t even fit him properly, but nonetheless looking like a king.  Not like Orlon, wise and gentle  and serene; but like a king from a storybook, a fae king of old, beautiful and regal and untouchable.  He suspected Millar’s advantage in ground would mean absolutely nothing in the end and felt a savage grin spread across his face as across the valley the men begin to move.  
  
Cathal forgot everything else with the first swing of his sword; there was nothing but the weapon in his hand, the horse underneath him, and the man who had lunged up at him falling back with his sword arm severed.  A cluster of three men grappling with each other got within range; he recognized one of his men and swung at his opponent, catching a glancing blow against his shoulder armor to sting his arm.  This allowed Baran to gain advantage, and Cathal turned his attention to someone rushing at him from the other side.  The fool grabbed at Chance’s bridle and as predictable as clockwork Chance reared up and struck out; the man dropped as a steel-shod hoof clapped him in the head.  Another man darted in, avoiding Chance’s quick hooves, and struck at Cathal’s leg, hitting his thigh plate hard enough to dent it.  The reverberation up his armor made his teeth sing but he dispatched the man quickly and looked around for the next challenge.  
  
There was a horse running loose, and he recognized Marcra and cursed under his breath.  Before he could locate Aedion a thrown dagger struck his shield; he yanked it out and threw it back at its owner, where it bounced harmlessly off the man’s armor.  The man swung at Chance next, and though the horse was nimble on his feet he couldn’t quite get out of range fast enough; he squealed and then spun and kicked out with both back feet and Cathal felt him connect with something.  Cathal looked down as Chance kicked out again, and could see a large flap of skin hanging from his horse’s shoulder.  The man who had attacked them was down and not moving, so he hopped off his plunging horse as quickly as his armor would allow it.  Chance quieted once Cathal was on the ground; the wound was deep enough slow him down but wouldn’t be fatal.  Before he could mount up again, he heard someone rush him; his horse reared up and the attacker backed off long enough for Cathal to organize and engage.    
  
He spun his sword, shifting his grip to adjust to being on the ground just in time to have his shield up to meet the other’s charge.  The man was almost as tall as Aedion and twice as wide.  Something gave in his wrist as the man hit his shield with his body, too slow to get his sword up.  Cathal almost laughed as he spun away and the man stumbled over his feet and fell; a quick swing and the man was twitching his last.  
  
And so it continued; he had no idea how long he parried and struck, parried and struck; his wrist burned and his leg burned and his arms stung; his throat was dry and his lips were cracked and he could taste nothing but blood and smell nothing but blood and shit and piss; his ears were full of the crash of metal and the screams of men.  It was all a blur of unimportant sensation until he heard the bugles blaring.  Everyone stopped, and hundreds of men turned as one.  
  
He couldn’t see what he was supposed to be looking at, just a sea of men; he could hear shouting but not words.  He began weaving his way through the soldiers, and they were all his soldiers.  When a cheer went up in a wave tears started in his eyes and he started to run: it was over, it was over, it was over…  
  
Then he heard Dewar’s voice, saw him plunging through the crowd on his huge horse.  When he saw Cathal, he yelled, “Rosach!  Go stop your boy before he bleeds out!”  
  
Cathal stared at him in confusion, the words not making any sense, then Dewar was in front of him and urging him up on the horse.  He sheathed his sword and dropped his shield, ignoring the bolt of pain as he peeled it off his arm.  “The stupid fucker doesn’t seem to know he’s injured, he’s still walking around, get up there!”  Dewar pointed in a direction and Cathal kicked hard.  The mare pinned her ears and leaped forward, scattering men from both sides as she galloped towards the hill where he saw a flash of gold; he got closer and the flash expanded into a man, into Aedion stumbling down the hill.  Aedion dropped to his knees as Cathal approached and flung himself off the horse.  As he ran the last couple feet, he could see the blood staining Aedion’s hands, soaking through his tunic underneath his armor and beginning to pool on the grass, and Cathal fought against the blackness that threatened to swamp him.  This was not the same, Aedion was not Luthias, and his turquoise eyes were burning triumphantly, not staring sightlessly at the sky.  
  
*****  
  
It was strange, really, how easy it was to flip from man to animal.  Much easier than spooling the animal back in.  
  
The instant that Millar’s men had begun to move, he had shifted into the predator that had always lurked beneath his skin.  Marcra had actually leaped the first line of men they came to, and Aedion’s sword had already been swinging as the horse’s front feet had touched down.  Every move Millar’s men made as they came at him, he could see telegraphed from miles away.  He realized after just a few minutes that he would be more effective on the ground than on the horse; his leaping dismount landed on one of his opponents, and a quick slash with his dagger had him moving no more.    
  
Men were falling before him before he realized he’d struck with his blades.  The smell of blood upped his frenzy, until everything was a red haze.  He was fighting his way up the hill, cleaving through the opposition as though through water, when three men launched at him at once from the higher advantage.  As his sword bit into the body of one, his arm was forced open, leaving him with his dagger to parry another.  The third lunged for the exposed area his ill-fitting armor had left on his abdomen.    
  
He spun away on pure instinct as the knife bit into him, slashing with his left hand across the throat of the man who wielded it.  The soldier fell, his hand still spasming onto the hilt of his knife, dragging it down through his navel and below.  Another move and the last man was down, and Aedion straightened, looking up into a pair of cold eyes that he instantly recognized as Colonel Millar’s.  
  
He didn’t think, didn’t let himself feel, just leaped up and took Millar right off his horse.  The animal spun away as the two men hit the ground; by the time they finished rolling, Aedion had Millar in a hold with a knife to his throat.  He got to his feet, dragging Millar with him.  
  
“Surrender or die,” he snarled, and the inhuman sound of his own voice startled him back into his body.  With a rush, the pain in his abdomen hit him, weakening his knees, and he wanted to glance down to see if his intestines were still in his body but he didn’t.    
  
Millar didn’t sound defeated when he replied; no, he still had the contemptuous defiance in his voice that Aedion had imagined from Cathal’s story, from the previous day’s letter.  “You can’t kill me.  You’ll never lead these men without me.”  
  
“I just did, you fool.”  
  
A man rushed at them, sword drawn, only to fall a few feet away with Aedion’s dagger in his throat.  Millar tried to pull away, but Aedion lifted him off his feet, holding him against his chest with one arm, his other hand cupping his jaw.  Several others approached more cautiously with their empty hands raised; Aedion recognized the man who had come for Conor Shaw among them, looking much the worse for wear.  
  
“I will ask you again, Colonel.  Surrender or die.”  
  
There were hoofbeats and footsteps and yelling, and a swarm of Aedion’s own men were coming up the hill to him, meeting no resistance.  A wave of relief hit him when he saw Raedan among them, untouched; the rear guard had pressed through, then; they had won.  Millar was looking at his men, and he stiffened up in Aedion’s hold, trying to drive an elbow into his injured gut.  “I will not surrender,” Millar said, defiant unto death.  
  
Aedion looked at the other men where they stood, grief and fatigue and resignation on their faces.  “You heard him choose,” he said to them.  One of them nodded.  With a quick motion, he snapped Millar’s neck; his limbs kicked out reflexively then went still.  Gently, Aedion laid him down on the grass, still hearing the crack echoing over and over in his ears; he pushed back up to his feet and met the others in the eye, one by one.  “I’m giving you the same choice,” he said, just loudly enough for them to hear.    
  
“We surrender,” the man who had nodded said wearily.  A bugle sounded from behind him, then another, and another, and the notes of victory were still hanging in the air as the commotion in the valley stuttered to a stop.  Aedion glanced down at himself for the first time, seeing blood soaking his front but nothing that should be inside his body sticking out.  Good.  
  
Raedan dismounted and was heading for him at a run but he turned, looking for the best spot to address his men.  Seeing a large rock jutting out of the hillside, he headed to it, Raedan and a handful of others falling in behind him.  Someone on a gray horse rode up, yelling something at him, but he couldn’t hear them, or wouldn’t; there were two things he had to do before he could stop.  
  
Clambering up on the rock, he surveyed the valley.  The vast majority of people below were standing, looking up at him; relatively few bodies dotted the grass, and the surge of relief gave power to his voice as he roared, “Soldiers of Terrasen!  Members of the Bane!  Today we join together to create one force!  One force to serve our people!  One force to protect those who can’t protect themselves!  Are you with me?”  
  
A cheer rose up to him, deafening him even where he stood.  He scanned the faces below, but he couldn’t see Cathal or Chance; he had to find him before he could rest.  Raedan grabbed at his arm, saying something, trying to push something at him, but he lowered himself off the rock and began walking down the hill.  His feet were clumsy and rocks kept pushing up out of the grass for him to trip over.  As he neared the valley floor more and more people were heading in his direction but none of them were the one he needed.  A familiar gray horse scattered the developing crowd, and his eyes skipped over the rider.  But something made him look back, and it wasn’t Dewar on the horse but Cathal.  He was alive, he was whole, and Aedion’s knees finally gave out as he saw the fire and fear in those dark eyes.  
  
Raedan was on him in a flash when he hit the ground, fumbling with the straps of his armor.  Other fingers began working on the other side, then the armor was lifted off just as Cathal reached him.  “You’re alive,” Aedion said stupidly.  
  
Cathal nodded.  “It’s over,” he said, “it’s over.”  Aedion hadn’t even noticed that his shirt had been cut off of him but he barked a curse when something was pressed over the wound on his abdomen.  
  
“Don’t move,” Raedan snapped.  “Craig is getting one of the healers.”  
  
“I’m all right,” Aedion said.  
  
Cathal made a familiar frustrated noise.  “You’re a rutting fool, is what you are.  Didn’t you realize you’d almost been gutted?”  
  
“It’s not that bad.”  
  
Sighing, Cathal shifted so he was behind him, wrapping a careful arm around his chest, coaxing him back.  The movement pulled a little at the wound but once he was leaning against that body he felt a sudden easing of pain he hadn’t yet acknowledged.  
  
People around him were talking but Aedion wasn’t tracking it.  Cathal was gently stroking his hair off his forehead, and he felt his eyes drifting closed despite the noise and the chill and the spattering of rain that was beginning to fall.  
  
“Aedion.”  Cathal’s voice was sharp and Aedion started awake.  
  
“Sorry,” he said, though he didn’t know why he was apologizing.  “I’m just so tired.”  There was muttering and someone handed Cathal a flask.  He held it up to Aedion’s lips and he sucked down the water greedily.  His mind began to clear.    
  
“Not too much, or he’ll vomit.”  He recognized Kelso’s voice.   The flask disappeared and he wanted to protest but the words were lost on the way to his mouth.  People came and went and there was talking, always talking.  Finally yet another man he didn’t recognize knelt down next to him and gently peeled back the blood moss Raedan had pressed to his wound.  He jerked involuntarily, and Cathal hissed quietly but held him fast.    
  
He felt lips at his ear, and Cathal began talking, quietly enough that only he could hear.  “You’re brilliant, do you know that?  Absolutely rutting brilliant.”  He kept murmuring the whole time the healer examined the wound, then as the blood moss was replaced and bound with strips of linen.    
  
The healer rose to his feet.  “The wound will need to be sutured, but it’s not life-threatening, it only got the first layer of muscle.  You’re a lucky man, Prince.”  Aedion nodded in acknowledgement while the others began discussing how to get him off the field.    
  
“I can walk,” Aedion said, shifting to get his feet under him and gritting his teeth against the lancing pain.  There was a round of cursing from everyone around him and then several people helped him up.  It was harder to get his balance than he expected and he grabbed onto Cathal’s arm.  Cathal’s flinch was full-body but he didn’t pull away, just stepped in closer to use his shoulder to keep Aedion upright, his face revealing nothing.  
  
The healer had noticed it though.  “Are you injured?” he asked.  
  
“It’s nothing,” Cathal said.  “It can wait,” he clarified, when the healer stared at him skeptically.  Aedion wanted to address it but it was taking all his concentration to remain on his feet now that the adrenalin of the fight had worn off.  He drank more water, and then with Cathal under one arm, Raedan under the other, he walked down the hill and across the field to where the healer’s tents had already been set up.    
  
Once on level ground, he was able to support himself, much to his relief.  His path to the tent was lined with men bowing, reaching out to touch him; most were familiar but there were a surprising number of Millar’s men - no, his men now.  Cathal was hyper-alert at his side but there was no need; it appeared the surrender had been absolute.  
  
He was ready to drop by the time he reached the tent.  Dewar called to Cathal; when he hesitated, Aedion nodded at him.  “I’m all right.  Go.”  With a searching look, Cathal returned the nod and disappeared.  
  
*****  
  
It took Cathal a ridiculous amount of time to catch his damn horse after Dewar had finished settling the plans for incorporating the new soldiers.  The healthy men would all go south to the tent camp, rather than north to Millar’s camp.  The wounded were going to Kemp’s family’s farm for care once stabilized enough to travel the couple of miles.  A hundred men from both camps had volunteered to catalog and bury the dead.  They had already begun gathering the casualties.  Cathal didn’t watch too closely, especially when he realized he recognized a handful of the bodies.  Distantly, but he still had to shove back against the darkness.  
  
Chance was having too good of a time cropping grass to want to be caught, and more than once Cathal had to dodge flying hooves, but finally he had the fool horse in hand.  He tethered him next to the other officers’ horses, then checked in.  He was relieved to see Grant when he walked over to where the majority of the officers were massed, though he was grim-faced and drenched in blood.  Not his, it turned out; Gillies’s.  Cathal’s former friend had lost his hand and nearly his life; the camp healer was still shaking her head over him.    
  
He had forgotten how long all of this took.  Longer than the battle itself, always; usually days longer.  When he finally, finally ducked into the tent Raedan was sitting next to Aedion while the healer stitched him up.  “Where the hell have you been,” Raedan demanded.  But Cathal ignored him, so caught up in the pain dimming Aedion’s eyes as he turned to face him.    
  
He stepped over cautiously, not wanting to disturb the healer.  As soon as he was close enough he extended his hand and Aedion grabbed it.  Settling in at Aedion’s shoulder, he let his eyes drift to where the healer was working.  The laceration was long and jagged and thankfully more than half closed.  Looking back at Aedion’s face, he said, “I’m glad that bloody knife didn’t go any lower.”  
  
Raedan rolled his eyes but Aedion’s lips twitched up.  “Not as glad as I am.”  
  
Cathal squeezed his fingers.  “No, I think I’m pretty much exactly as glad as you are.”  
  
Aedion’s breathed laugh turned into a grimace of pain and Cathal felt a twinge of guilt.  The healer glanced briefly between them before returning to his job.  “Don’t make him laugh,” he said mildly.  “And then you need to let me look at that hand.”  
  
Aedion looked at the hand he was holding, then turned his head to see the other but couldn’t from where he was laying.  “What did you do?”  
  
Cathal shrugged.  “My shield got jammed back into it by someone with more size than skill.  I think it’s sprained.”  
  
There was a short silence, broken mostly by Aedion grunting.  “Why are you in so much pain?” Cathal asked.  “Weren’t you given a tonic?”  
  
Raedan snorted, his expression torn between anger and exasperation.  “What do you think?  The fool wouldn’t take it.”  
  
Aedion looked unrepentant.  “I didn’t want to have something clouding my judgement right now.”  Cathal understood when he saw the ghosts in his eyes.  Better to be aware and in pain than unable to defend himself.    
  
“Will you take something now?”  He brushed his lips against his forehead, ignoring the presence of the others.    
  
“Later.  After you get taken care of.”  Cathal sighed.  At least it was a compromise of sorts.  
  
“What’s going on out there?” Raedan asked, and Cathal explained about the plan.  He talked for a while, keeping Aedion distracted, but kept skirting around the casualties until finally Aedion flat-out asked him.  
  
“I’m not sure overall, to be honest.  I know of five of our men are gone, and a few major injuries, but we mostly got out of there with cuts and bruises.”  
  
“And the other side?” Raedan asked.  Cathal suspected he was directing them away from who exactly was gone.  
  
“So far they’ve counted sixty losses, not sure how many serious injuries.”    
  
“Who died?” Aedion asked.  Cathal looked at Raedan, and Aedion caught the look, turning abruptly from injured lover into commanding officer.  “Tell me who died, now.”    
  
Cathal sighed.  “Niven, Riach, the other Craig, Tulach, and Hay.”  The last name twisted a knife in Cathal’s chest; Hay had been a gift, always cheerful, always smoothing rough edges.  Aedion’s jaw worked, and Raedan put his face in his hands, shoulders shaking.  Cathal bent and pressed his lips to Aedion’s forehead again.  Aedion squeezed his eyes shut in response, and tears trickled silently down his cheeks.  
  
The healer finished and carefully bandaged him.  Then he turned to Cathal, who held out his left arm with resignation.  Even the gentle touch of the healer’s experienced fingers sent bolts of heat and cold up to his shoulder, and as those fingers prodded down his hand he could feel an unstable creak.  He focused all his energy on keeping his face impassive, knowing Aedion would catch every flicker.    
  
He couldn’t hold back the breath of relief when the healer released his hand.  “You thought this was a sprain?” the healer asked skeptically.  Cathal shrugged and the man sighed.  “You warriors are all the same,” he muttered as he walked over to his kit and began pulling lengths of material out.  “You fractured two bones in your hand and probably at least that many in your wrist.  Now hold still.”  He carefully cleaned the blood and mud off his arm, then measured and trimmed and wrapped until after an eternity Cathal’s arm was immobilized below the elbow.  Raedan left while the interminable bandaging was still going on, and once the healer had finally left with strict instructions to Aedion to avoid exertion Cathal settled onto the ground next to the cot.  
  
The flaps rattled, and it wasn’t Raedan who pushed through but Dewar.  He was closely followed by two men Cathal didn’t recognize, and he leaped to his feet and reached for his dagger.  Aedion touched his arm lightly as he pushed himself into a sitting position.  All three men bowed, and Aedion inclined his head in response.  
  
 “Sir,” one of the strangers said, “please forgive us for disturbing you.  I am Kieran Harper, and I would like to offer you the service of our carriage and wagons to aid in getting the wounded to a better location for recovery.”    
  
Cathal could tell Aedion was as surprised by this as he was.  When he realized what Aedion intended, he extended his good hand to him, and pulled him to his feet.  “Thank you, Kieran,” Aedion said, with a small bow that no doubt was excruciating.  “We’re going to Kemp’s, correct?” he said, turning to Dewar.  Receiving confirmation, he turned back to Harper.  “When can you have them ready?”  
  
“They’re here now, sir.  We,” he gestured to the other man, “went back to get them as soon as the plan was clear.”  
  
The other man was introduced as Ellar Weir, and at Dewar’s insistence Aedion was loaded into the carriage.  A couple of other men with deep sword wounds were added, then Kemp hopped in to smooth the transition with his family.  Cathal climbed to the driver’s seat along with Harper.  
  
The few miles passed slowly, Harper driving cautiously to avoid jostling the injured men.  Cathal warmed to him as a result.  He was a captain as well; had fought under Millar for years before the takeover, and had stayed with him afterwards.  “After you came last fall,” he said, “we tried to talk to him.  We wanted to at least see what Ashryver had in mind.  But…well, the colonel hadn’t been the same since the war.  I think he was just so convinced it was a trick, or that Ashryver was just a figurehead.”  
  
“And what do you think now?”  
  
Harper gave a grim laugh.  “I just saw that man cut down twenty capable soldiers in a matter of minutes.  He’s not a figurehead, that’s for damn sure.  But,” he shrugged, “then he gave Millar two chances to surrender.  This wasn’t a mindless slaughter.  I’m looking forward to seeing what he plans going forward.  From what Marks told us, I don’t think he’ll hold us against our will.”  
  
Cathal’s respect for Harper rose dramatically.  
  
Though the sun had not reached its apex before the battle was over, it was sinking below the horizon by the time they reached the Kemp farm.  Aedion had tightened up in the carriage, and Cathal felt horrible for making him climb out.  Still, it was a relief to be able to wash and get into clean clothes and even more to eat something.  Best of all was following Aedion into the room Kemp’s parents had prepared for them, thoughtfully having placed a cot near the large bed.  It had surprised him, how ready they were for the mob of injured men who had descended upon them, but Mrs. Kemp had shaken her head sadly when he had commented.  “This isn’t the first battle what’s taken place near here, and it won’t be the last.”    
  
As soon as the door was closed behind them Aedion had taken his face in his hands and kissed him fiercely, despite the fact that he was swaying on his feet.  Cathal was near tears by the time they broke apart; he hadn’t realized how terrified he had been that they would never be able to do this again until that moment.  “I love you,” he whispered, well aware that the house was full of people.  “Thank you for not dying.”  
  
Aedion laughed and then clenched his teeth, moving to press a hand to his abdomen but thinking better of it.  Cathal kissed him again, softly this time; an apology.  “I’m comfortable now that I have this club on my arm,” he said; it was mostly true.  “So take the pain tonic and get some sleep.  I’ll be here.”  
  
Aedion agreed without grumbling, a sign in itself of how much pain he was in.  Cathal poured a little into a glass of liquor and Aedion downed it in one go, grimacing.  He carefully arranged himself under the blankets, then patted the spot next to him.  Unbuckling his dagger, Cathal lay down on top of the covers, trying to keep a few inches between them but Aedion tugged him closer.  Cathal kissed him, gently but thoroughly, until Aedion began to droop with sleep.  
  
He was still awake, fretting that nobody had come to report yet, when Aedion woke up a few hours later.  Before he could even ask how he was feeling, Aedion grabbed his shirt and pulled him down for a kiss.  It started out soft but didn’t stay that way; when Cathal finally broke away they were both breathless.    
  
“I think you promised me something,” Aedion said.    
  
Cathal raised an eyebrow at him.  “Did I?”  
  
“I distinctly remember you saying I could fuck you after the battle.”  
  
“Only you would be thinking of that with a ten inch long wound in your abdomen,” Cathal laughed.  “You’re incorrigible.”  
  
“That’s not the word I was thinking of, but it works.”  His eyes softened as he reached up and touched Cathal’s face.  Cathal turned to kiss his palm, unable to put a name to the feeling that swamped him.  Love, but not just love.  Gratitude too, and yet still more.  Love and gratitude, want and need, comfort and hope and deep, unshakeable joy.    
  
Cathal kissed him again, first on the lips, then trailing his mouth down his jaw to his neck and lower, brushing against his exposed collarbone.  Reaching down, he palmed Aedion through the blankets and found him already hard; he smiled against his skin.  “I really do want to fuck you,” Aedion murmured, brushing fingers lightly through his hair.     
  
“But do you want to be the one to tell the healer that you undid all his hard work because my mouth isn’t enough for you?”  
  
He could hear Aedion’s grin in his voice.  “Well, if you put it that way…”  
  
Cathal got off the bed and locked the door.  When he returned, Aedion had started to push back the covers; Cathal grabbed them and flipped them back, then sucked in a breath.  Aedion’s abdomen above and below the bandage was an array of blue and blackish purple.  He didn’t even want to know what it looked like underneath the white wrap.  “Maybe you should’ve turned out the lights?” Aedion asked lightly.  
  
Cathal met his eyes, trying to read him.  There was desire there, yes; but there was something else harder to recognize.  “I don’t want to hurt you,” he said, kneeling next to him and cupping his jaw, feeling the roughness under his fingers.  
  
“I know,” Aedion replied, leaning into his touch.  He looked like he was going to say more but ended up just closing his eyes.  Cathal brushed his cheek with his thumb, then his lips.  Abruptly he remembered another night after another day of pain and loss; another’s skin under his hands, and being burned up by his own need.  This, he understood; the need to prove one’s own survival, to affirm what was worth going on for.  Pressing his palm over Aedion’s heart, he felt the steady thump, the vital realness of him, and his desire surged.  
  
“You have to tell me if I do.”  He took Aedion’s mouth with his own, swallowing his acquiescence, allowing himself to become lost in the heat, the slide of his tongue, the faint burn of stubble against his chin.  Aedion kissed him back with almost bruising force, gripping the back of his neck, holding on as if Cathal might somehow dissolve into nothingness.  “I’m here,” he murmured against Aedion’s lips.  “I’m here.”  
  
When Cathal moved his mouth to Aedion’s jaw, those fingers finally softened and with it the edge of desperation.  He wanted to taste every inch of him, but that would have to wait until he wasn’t more bruise than man.  Instead he shifted to kneel between Aedion’s calves, running his fingers lightly up the insides of his legs.  Aedion’s breath caught, and Cathal followed his fingers with his mouth until Aedion growled his name.    
  
The moan that Aedion let out when Cathal finally took him in his mouth got Cathal’s own blood stirring.  Bracing his splinted arm awkwardly on the bed, he grasped the base of Aedion’s cock in his good hand and worked him with his hand and his mouth until Aedion was gasping.  
  
The knock on the door made them both jump, and Cathal gagged and had to take his mouth off Aedion.  “Colonel Ashryver?” came an unfamiliar voice from the hallway.  “Are you all right?”  
  
“Yes, I’m fine,” Aedion managed to grind out, his hands fisted in the blankets and his legs trembling.  
  
“Do you need a pain tonic?  I can fetch you one,” the unknown man said from the hallway.  Cathal started grinning as he resumed working Aedion with his hand.  
  
“No, thank you,” Aedion said, struggling to make his voice sound even remotely normal.  “Captain Rosach will give me something to help me out.”  Cathal started laughing, muffling the noise in his shoulder and losing his rhythm.  
  
There was a short pause in the hallway, then, “Very well, sir.  I’m right down the hall if you need anything.”  
  
Footsteps sounded, and there was a muffled click of a door.  Cathal crawled up alongside Aedion to kiss him, still chuckling.  “You need to be quiet,” he whispered.  
  
“You need to be less good at this, then,” Aedion replied.  “At least you locked the door.”  
  
“Yes, at least one of us knows how to do that.”  Aedion bit his lip gently in retaliation for that comment and Cathal returned to his version of providing pain relief.  
  
Afterwards, when the lights were out and Aedion was sleeping off yet more pain tonic and alcohol, Cathal lay next to him still unable to sleep despite his own exhaustion.  Every time he closed his eyes he saw Aedion falling to his knees, his blood soaking into the grass.  This was different than before; this was not Luthias; this was not the end.  
  
But in a way it was.  If Aedion had died… he couldn’t even imagine what his reaction would have been.  Didn’t want to imagine.  He feared his dagger would have looked too friendly in that situation.  So he lay there counting the breaths next to him, and began to wonder if perhaps…perhaps there were gods who looked out for him after all.  
  
He was just beginning to feel himself drift away when there was a quiet knock on the door.  A glance at Aedion showed him still sleeping soundly, so he eased off the bed and went to answer.  It was dark, but he recognized a weeping Kelso and he stepped into the hall and shut the door.  
  
“Rosach, oh gods, it’s Gillies -”  
  
Cathal was moving before Kelso finished, and the lieutenant scrambled to lead him to another guest room, one that was packed with injured men.  Gillies was struggling to breathe, his lips pulled back from his teeth, body arching with the effort.  His face looked odd, ghostly; those lips were blue and his eyes were staring wide but unseeing.  The healer was at his head, trying to hold him up but he was straining too hard.  
  
Weaving between the cots, Cathal reached him and put a hand on his shoulder.  “Henry,” he said, and tears stung his eyes when he realized he couldn’t remember the last time he’d said his name.  “Henry, I’m here.”  Gillies’s agonized face turned towards him though Cathal doubted he knew who he was.  “Henry, it’s Cathal, I’m here.”  Slipping an arm under his shoulders, Cathal pushed him up into a half-sitting position then sat behind him, holding him up with his own body, and after a long moment his breathing began to ease.  
  
Dewar crashed through the door with the Kemp’s healer on his heels, making everybody flinch.  “What the hell is going on?” Dewar demanded, shoving his way over but not reaching out to Gillies so as to allow the healer to step up to him.  
  
“He’s lost so much blood,” the camp healer said, tears in her eyes.  “I think he’s starting to clot where he shouldn’t.  His whole right lung, he’s not moving air through it.”  The other healer made his assessment, and when the two of them looked at each other, Cathal knew.  
  
Dewar didn’t see it; maybe couldn’t.  “What can we do?”  
  
She shook her head helplessly.    
  
Cathal turned his attention back to the man in his arms, ignoring the quiet but fierce discussion between the major and the two healers..  He thought Henry’s lips were looking worse, rather than better, even though he wasn’t struggling as hard.    
  
With nothing else to do, he just started talking.  He didn’t really know what he was saying at first, but then the stories from their long-ago friendship began pouring out of him.  Speaking barely above a whisper, he recalled all the trouble they got into as boys new to the army, all their fights that seemed silly now, the girls they had flirted with, the time they stole liquor from Dewar and drank themselves into a stupor.  As he talked, he felt Henry relax against him until he seemed to be sleeping, though his breath still came in short puffs.  Eventually, Cathal ran out of the good stories and fell silent.  
  
He wasn’t paying attention to the low hum in the rest of the room until it suddenly stopped.  Looking up, he saw Aedion standing in the doorway, pale-faced, looking twice his age as he took everything in.  Coming into the room, he nodded acknowledgement to the murmured “Colonel” from everyone else as he carefully picked his way through the crowded space.  Aedion stopped right next to Cathal, brushing his back lightly with his fingers while the healer filled him in on the situation.    
  
Aedion asked if they should move either Gillies or the other men, so they could get some rest.  The healer didn’t want to move Gillies, but Aedion offered up his room for anyone who wanted sleep.  Not a single man moved; Sillar spoke up.  “Respectfully, sir, we want to hold this vigil with you.  Captain Gillies would do it for us.”  Aedion nodded as the others murmured their agreement, and not another word about moving anybody was said.  
  
While they were talking, Gillies suddenly began to thrash and choke; pink foam started to pour out of his mouth and nose and Cathal reflexively rolled him onto his side.  The healer helped support him until he was finished, and then his breathing was slightly easier.  Blinking, he looked up at Cathal, seeming surprised to see him.  “Rosach,” he whispered.  “Rosach, where’s Luthias?  He was just here.”    
  
Cathal didn’t know if Gillies was hallucinating, or if Luthias’s ghost was really there in that moment; or perhaps Henry was so close to the veil separating the worlds that he could catch glimpses through it.   He could feel the tears rolling down his cheeks, but there was no way to brush them away without disturbing Henry so he let them fall where they would.  Aedion’s eyes were on him; he didn’t know what to say.  Henry got more agitated, calling for Luthias again and again, and the healer asked quietly, “Who is Luthias?  Can we fetch him?”  
  
“No,” Cathal answered.  “We can’t fetch him.”  His voice broke, and he struggled for a moment before he went on.  “Luthias was our friend.  He…he died in the last battle against Adarlan.”  
  
Aedion put his hand on Henry’s shoulder and began to speak in another language.  Really it was somewhere between a chant and a song, more than speaking, and after a few words Cathal recognized the Old Language.  It was beautiful in Aedion’s rich baritone, and Henry settled down, eyes trained on Aedion’s face.    
  
Henry stayed calm as long as Aedion continued chanting, though his breathing became progressively more labored. Everyone in the room was mesmerized by it, even as Aedion’s voice grew hoarse; the Old Language words seemed to draw peace out of the air, or out of the people themselves.  
  
The calm made it so that nobody but Aedion, Cathal, and the healers noticed when Henry slipped unconscious for the final time, his eyes half-closed and suddenly empty. Cathal could feel when Henry’s body got heavier, a split second before the gasping began anew. This time, though, there was nothing frantic about it. It was slow, almost random; as if even though his soul was gone, his body could not quite accept its disappearance and so kept on breathing for a few minutes out of habit.  Aedion’s eyes were unfathomably sad as they met Cathal’s, but he didn’t break off. Henry’s soul still had to be sung on through the veil.  
  
It took Cathal sliding off the cot and laying Henry gently back before the rest of the room realized. Dewar stumbled over and fell to his knees next to him, cursing in dry, ragged sobs. Aedion’s voice lifted, finding strength again. “ _Bafheidir go bhfaidigh tu siochain agus gloire ar an taobh eile_.” Cathal didn’t know the meaning, but he had always loved the soft syllables of the Old Language, and he found the stabbing pain in his chest lessened just a little as the song came to an end.  
  
He was startled when he stepped away from the cot that held a body that was no longer Henry Gillies and realized day had come; somehow he had missed the brightening of the room.  One by one, the soldiers who could walk approached and touched their fingers to their lips then to Henry’s forehead.  Not just the handful who had been in the room with them, but dozens more who must have been scattered through the farmhouse.  Cathal allowed himself to be gently but inexorably shoved out of the way.  
  
Once out in the hall, he walked numbly to the room he and Aedion had made love in hours or days or a lifetime before.  He stood in the empty room feeling nothing in particular aside from a bone-deep weariness that he knew would not let him sleep.  After a minute he turned and found Aedion standing in the doorway, turquoise eyes burning.  Some distant part of him was surprised; he supposed he expected Aedion to stay with the others.  He moved to close the door and Aedion stepped past him to allow it.  The latch clicked with a sharp finality, and the fragile walls that had been holding him together shattered.  
  
He fell forward, bracing his splinted forearm against the door and Aedion was there, arms tightly around him, pulling him close as his body shook with the force of silent sobs.  He didn’t know how long Aedion was whispering his name before it registered, before he could feel the light trail of lips against his throat.  When he finally hiccoughed himself into calm they just stood there in each others’ arms, Aedion’s cheek resting on his head.  
  
“I think I might be a horrible person,” Aedion finally murmured.  Cathal pulled away just enough to be able to look at him in silent question.  “As sad and angry as I am about the men we lost, all of them… I’m just so grateful it wasn’t you.”  
  
Cathal drew a shaky breath.  “Same.”  He gave a short laugh without humor.  “We can be horrible together, I suppose.”  He nestled back in, careful of Aedion’s injury.  “I’m just… I wish I’d forgiven him sooner.”  Aedion replied by cupping his face in his hands and tilting it back to meet his lips, and Cathal didn’t know if it was Aedion’s tears or his own he was tasting.  
  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Comments and kudos are greatly appreciated! I love hearing what you think!


	24. Chapter 24

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, so this has taken...way too long. I've literally cut out over 10000 words over the course of writing this, mostly because they were crap but some of it because it was just irrelevant. (It may make an appearance later.) Anyway, sorry for the delay and hope at least someone is still reading!
> 
> Trigger warning for a kind of disturbing dream and the usual references to past events.

Mikkal stood at the docks, watching the men load up the ship.  It wasn’t the one he would be taking; no, this one was heading south.  But it was strangely soothing to watch their coordinated movements, they way they anticipated each other, the easy jerks of their muscles as they threw crates to each other.  His ship wouldn’t be in for another few days, but he was ready.  
  
He turned and saw Cherise standing, watching him, her brown hair blowing in her face.  Sighing, he walked over to her.  “I’m leaving,” he said when he reached her.  
  
“All right,” she replied in her amused voice.  “Planning to visit the slums next?”  
  
“Adarlan, I’m leaving Adarlan.”  The glimmer in her gray eyes told him she already knew that, and he wanted to kick himself for getting caught up in her verbal trap yet again.  He had honestly loved living with her and the other girls all these months; they made him laugh and think and kept him from getting locked up in his head.  He had to stay on his toes to avoid Cherise’s verbal knives, and he suspected that was good for him.  But it was time.  
  
“Where are you going, Terrasen?” she asked, and he wondered what Delaney had told her.  
  
“No.  Wendlyn.”  He shrugged at her raised eyebrow.  “I need to go somewhere with no ghosts.”  
  
Her broad mouth curved into a wicked smile.  “From what I know of Wendlyn, you’ll find more ghosts there.  Magic is free, after all.”  
  
“Yes, but none of them will mean anything to me.”  She nodded, accepting that without question or judgement.  He began walking back to the apartment.  
  
“Don’t you want to know what I came here to tell you?” she called after him.  He turned back.  “Word just came from Terrasen, I found out from one of my father’s cronies.”  His throat went dry, and he curled his trembling hands into fists.  “Colonel Ashryver met the rebels in battle four weeks ago.  His men routed them in under an hour.”    
  
Mikkal closed his eyes and fought for control.  “What were the casualties?”  He couldn’t recognize his own voice.  
  
“Eight losses on Ashryver’s side, over two hundred on the rebels’.  The remaining four hundred or so surrendered after Ashryver broke the leader’s neck with his bare hands.”  
  
_Oh, Aedion, Aedion_.  “Why are you telling me this?”  
  
Cherise shrugged casually, as if this information would mean nothing to him, but there was compassion in her eyes.  “Because there’s a couple of details you should know, that you won’t get in the papers.”  He looked at her in a wordless plea.  “Before Ashryver broke his neck, he gave the man, I think his name was Miles?  No, that’s not right.  Anyway, he gave him the option to surrender or die.  The man obviously chose not to surrender.  And secondly, Ashryver did it with a gut wound.”    
  
Mikkal swallowed down the bile that rose, but he couldn’t stop himself from putting a hand on his own scar.  “How serious?”  
  
“Supposedly not life threatening, but bad enough that it’s going to make him a legend.  You should’ve heard the old general growing maudlin about it.  I think Adarlan is going to have a new favorite general soon.”  
  
He nodded.  Of course; of course Aedion wouldn’t just win but would do it in such a showy fashion.  He wanted to laugh, but he was choking too hard on his tears.  “Thank you for telling me,” he said once he could speak.  
  
They started walking back together.  “You know the King will invite him down here,” Cherise said after a few minutes of silence.  “More like order him, I imagine.”  
  
“Most likely.”  
  
“When do you leave?”  
  
“The ship docks next week.  We’ll leave once they’ve resupplied.”    
  
She grabbed his arm and he stopped.  “But he’s coming down here.  You’ll be able to see him again.”  
  
Mikkal shook his head.  “I can’t,” he said quietly.  “I can’t do that to him, or to myself.”  Her mouth tightened, and her eyes were too bright as she studied him.  Unable to bear that look on her face, he started moving again.  She refused to relinquish his arm, as if she thought he would bolt if she did.  
  
“Why didn’t Delaney come tell me?” he asked.  
  
“She’s still crying in the apartment.  She thought she’d scare you.”  
  
“Is Raedan all right?” he asked, alarmed and angry with himself that he hadn’t thought of him.  
  
“Oh, yes, he wasn’t on the casualty list.  I think she’s just relieved.”  
  
Well, he could understand that, though relief wasn’t readily identifiable in his own sea of emotions.  All he could picture was Aedion swinging his sword through his countrymen, through the people he had vowed on his own blood to protect.  Mikkal had never been good at that part of it, at deciding who should die so more could live.  He had killed on orders; he had killed to save himself; but had nearly lost himself in the killing.  He hoped Aedion’s soul wore better armor than his own.  
  
The second he was through the door Delaney was on him, his arms wrapping reflexively around her as she smiled through her tears.  “They’re all right,” she kept saying, over and over, unable to see that he couldn’t quite join in her joy.  Cherise was watching him too closely still.  It was as if she knew that he was hearing the clash of weapons instead of Delaney’s murmurs, smelling mud and blood and piss instead of the roast that was evidently going to be the evening meal.  That with one blink he saw Aedion lying crumpled and bleeding out; with the next him slicing the throat of another man, nothing human in his eyes.  
  
He pushed Delaney away gently and ran for the bathing room, barely able to close the door behind him before he brought up his lunch.  Sitting back on his heels once he was through, he used his sleeve to rub the sweat and tears off his face.  There was a quiet knock on the door and Delaney came in, Maida hovering behind her.  Cherise and Avis were nowhere to be seen, and he was grateful for that.  
  
“Mikkal, are you all right?”  The gentleness of Delaney’s voice almost undid him again.  
  
“I’m fine.”  
  
She looked at him with a spark of temper behind the concern in her eyes.  “Let me rephrase that.  Mikkal, what’s wrong?”  He just shook his head and she stepped closer, dropping a hand on his shoulder.  “Aedion was injured, but the report indicated he was going to be all right.”  
  
“Physically, maybe,” Mikkal finally said.  “I’m not sure any of us are ever all right after.”  
  
“He was raised for this.”  
  
“So was I, Delaney.  Even more than he was, if it comes down to it.”  He rocked back so he was leaning against the bathroom wall and let his arms hang loosely around his knees.  “I understand killing an individual for a reason,” he said slowly, meeting her eyes and seeing remembrance of how they met in their green depths.  “Protection, or revenge.  But in battle…you don’t even know who you’re killing, or why, really.  You could completely agree with each other but grew up in a different land or got recruited by a different officer, and now one of you is going to kill the other.  Like somehow your life is more important than theirs.  But what if it’s not?  What if they are actually the better man?”  Delaney opened her mouth to speak but he plowed on.  “You’ll never know, because you’ve trained to cut their throat or gut them or shoot an arrow through their eye on the order of someone else, and so you do it.  You get so lost in the battle fury that you don’t even hesitate, most of the time.  It’s like you don’t even control your own mind.  But you never know if you are on the right side or not.  You have to either trust that you are, or not care, and I can’t do either.”  
  
Maida ducked around Delaney and crawled into his lap, nestling in close.  He pressed one hand into his eyes, trying to drive out the images of people falling at the end of his blades while the other arm wrapped around her.    
  
“Cherise said you’re leaving,” Delaney said after a long silence.  
  
“Yes,” he said.  “Next week.”  
  
“I’m sorry,” she said.  He ducked his head, resting his cheek against Maida’s silky hair as she clung to him.  When he looked up to reply Delaney was gone.  
  
*****  
  
Aedion thought he suppressed his sigh of relief as they broke through the trees and saw the distant walls of the camp, but Cathal’s attention flicked to him anyway.  They had been gone for a little over four weeks, and in that time spring had blossomed out all over and was racing towards summer.  The fields that led up to the gate were a riot of purple and yellow and white, the tiny flowers almost obscuring the grass underneath.  He grinned as he touched Marcra into a jog, not looking to see if Cathal followed.  The gates were rolled open as they approached and a flood of his men came out to greet him and the company that followed in his wake.  Until that moment, he hadn’t realized how much this rough camp had become home.    
  
He had sent half of his soldiers back a few days after the battle to alert those who remained at camp to prepare for the influx of new soldiers.  Yet he was still surprised to see a whole new barracks standing, and another house framed out next to his own.  Dewar approached, and he hopped off Marcra.    
  
“This is unexpected,” he said with a grin.  
  
“Don’t get too excited, they’re not done yet,” Dewar replied.  
  
“Still, this is a lot more than I expected, I thought half our men would be camping for most of the summer.”  
  
Dewar shrugged, looking past Aedion at the stream of men coming through the gate.  “The barracks was already framed out when we got back,” he said.  “Evidently the men we left behind were pretty confident.”  He looked Aedion up and down.  “You look a hell of a lot better than the last time I saw you.”  
  
“Good as new, just another scar to add to the collection.”  
  
Dewar looked like there was something he wanted to say, but a swarm of men approached, Cathal and Kemp among them.  Stable boys arrived to take the horses, several of them unfamiliar, and Aedion felt an inexplicable sense of grief that he couldn’t account for with the new faces, the new chairs in the dining hall, the doubled gardens that extended behind the dining hall.  
  
The afternoon passed in a rush of activity and questions and catching up.  Raedan had been sending letters up from Orynth every few days since he got there, and Aedion spent an hour reading them and composing a long response.  He missed his brother fiercely, with his constant teasing humor and blunt confrontations.  Sending him with a small group of soldiers to the capitol had not been an easy decision, but he had been uncomfortable all winter leaving the city garrison with just Hirons, Dorsey, and Osment in charge.  Not that he didn’t trust the men, at least somewhat.  But they weren’t Raedan.  
  
Fortunately it appeared the winter had been quiet, and the rumors about the battle—though they exaggerated both the losses of Millar’s men and Aedion’s own prowess—had kept the Adarlanian soldiers secure in their advantage.  Hirons had stopped the hangings for petty crimes, but had been unable to prevent the prisoners from being sentenced to Endovier.  Aedion wasn’t sure which was worse; for himself, he thought he’d likely prefer the quick drop and sudden stop to the prolonged execution that was the salt mines.  He was going to have to talk to Grant and see if there was some legal way he could gain control over the sentencing of prisoners.    
  
Though the days were growing long, it was full dark by the time Aedion finally made it back to his house.  He gave Grant and Dewar a nod, kissed Mrs. Dewar on the cheek while accepting the plate of pastries she handed him, and dragged himself up the stairs, wondering where the hell Cathal was.  He had sat with him at dinner, but otherwise he might have been a ghost for all he saw of him.  
  
He pushed open his door to find Cathal, most decidedly solid and real and alive, sitting on his bed with his hair still damp from a bath.  By the time the pastries were safely on the desk, Cathal’s mouth was on his.  He allowed himself to be pushed back against the closing door as a calloused hand slipped under his shirt, carefully avoiding the livid scar that divided his abdomen.  It wasn’t sensitive anymore, but he doubted he could persuade Cathal of that.  
  
Cathal’s lips transferred to his neck and he could feel himself responding with laughable eagerness.  They hadn’t really touched each other other than a few stolen kisses since the night after the battle.  Ready fingers slipped under the back of his pants and he growled a curse before dropping his head to bite down over the vein in Cathal’s throat.  
  
“I won’t be able to hide a mark there,” Cathal breathed.  
  
“I don’t care,” Aedion replied, though he returned to his task with a lightened mouth.  
  
They were so wrapped up in each other that the sharp knock on the door made them both jump.  
  
“What.”  
  
“It’s me,” came Grant’s voice.    
  
“Can’t I have five minutes?” Aedion snapped.  
  
“Five?” Cathal asked, not bothering to keep his voice down.  “Really?”  
  
“At this point, two would probably be enough.”  
  
“Hmm, two minutes and a gag,” Cathal said thoughtfully.  
  
There was a cough on the other side of the door.  “On second thought, this can wait until morning.”  
  
“Good idea,” Aedion said, and they listened to footsteps departing down the hall before Cathal drew his attention back by squeezing his ass  Then he lost himself in the taste of Cathal’s mouth and the feel of broad muscle under his hands, all fatigue chased away by the hunger burning low in his gut.  
  
Cathal broke off to murmur against Aedion’s lips, “You may think five minutes will be enough, but I think it’ll take at least that long to get me ready.”  
  
“Get you…Wait, really?”  
  
He wished he could somehow bottle the throaty laugh Cathal gave him.  “I didn’t forget our bargain, even if you did.”  
  
“Never.”  Twisting Cathal’s shirt in his hands, he backed him towards the bed. Cathal knocked his hands away before he could tear the fabric, tugging it off over the splint that remained on his left arm and tossing it in a corner of the room.  The rest of their clothes soon followed and they fell onto the bed.  
  
It had been weeks since he’d had Cathal all to himself, since he’d been able to enjoy the feel and taste and sound of him.  Contrary to his earlier words, he took his time, relishing every second, every twitch and moan.  And when Cathal was ready, and Aedion eased into him, he found himself trembling, unsure if it was from need or fear or love or a swirl of all three.    
  
Cathal dragged Aedion’s mouth to his, kissing him until his tremors stopped.  Slowly, carefully, he began to move.  It was almost overwhelming, Cathal’s tongue in his mouth and hand in his hair, his leather and resin scent, his body wrapped around him; every movement garnering a reaction, a hitch of breath, a quiet moan against his lips, a twist of fingers, his name whispered like a prayer.  Every moment Aedion started to disappear from his body, Cathal would draw him back.  
  
When Cathal slipped a hand between them to grip himself he tumbled over the edge, the way his body tightened with his release dragging Aedion with him.  They kissed breathlessly through the aftershocks and Aedion realized he was trembling again, while Cathal’s fingers traced soothing circles in his hair, up his back.  “Are you all right?” Cathal murmured.  
  
Aedion huffed a laugh.  “I think I should be asking you that.”  
  
“Mmm.”  Lips traced up Aedion’s throat, followed by Cathal’s tongue.  “I’m more than all right.”  
  
“You’re going to get me going again,” Aedion warned as teeth nibbled beneath his ear.  
  
Cathal didn’t stop until Aedion twisted away and headed for the bathing room.  When he came out toweling his hair, there were fresh sheets on the bed and two cups of tea next to the pastries.  Falling asleep with Cathal in his arms should have been enough to keep the nightmares away.  
  
It wasn’t.  
  
He woke up snarling, a body pinned into the bed beneath him and the smell of blood in the room.  Almost immediately he lost the battle with his stomach, barely making it into the bathing room.  Strong hands brushed the hair back off his forehead.  “You’re all right,” said a muffled gravelly voice next to him.  “It was a dream.  You’re safe.”  
  
Once he was done heaving he glanced up at Cathal, whose face was oddly blurry.  Air fully filled his lungs and the room snapped into focus; he cursed sharply.  Blood was smeared across the lower half of Cathal’s face, thick enough that Aedion couldn’t tell where it was stemming from.  He reached up to touch him but stopped himself before he could do more damage, cursing again.    
  
“Does that always happen?” Cathal asked softly.    
  
Aedion shrugged with false casualness.  “You know I get nightmares.”  
  
“You haven’t in months, and that wasn’t my question.”  The fingers still tracing lines on Aedion’s scalp were gentle despite the quiet admonition.  _Be honest_ , the healer’s voice echoed in his ear.  
  
“Not always,” Aedion said, pushing to his feet and examining Cathal’s face.  He dampened a washcloth and began wiping the blood off carefully.  “But…a lot of the time.”  
  
Cathal was quiet while Aedion cleaned his face.  His upper lip was split and beginning to swell and there was a slight trickle of blood from one nostril but his nose when Aedion felt along it appeared undamaged.  When Aedion was finished, Cathal took the cloth from him and rinsed it out, then bent to rinse his mouth under the tap.  He was still watching the pink-tinged water swirl down the drain when he asked, just the faintest hint of pain in his voice, “With women too?”  
  
“Yes,” Aedion said.  “Though I don’t generally share a bed with them, so it’s not been much of an issue.”  
  
“For them,” Cathal clarified.  “It’s not been an issue for them.  It’s obviously an issue for you.”  
  
Aedion bristled.  “It’s not a big deal.”  
  
“What was it about?” Cathal challenged, crossing his arms and sniffing at the thin bloody trickle that threatened to escape.  Aedion looked at him blankly.  “Your nightmare.  If it’s not a big deal, tell me what it was about.”  
  
“Has anybody ever told you you’re a prick?”  
  
Cathal grinned without humor.  “Only everyone who’s ever met me.”  
  
Aedion’s feet started to itch, and he had to move, prowling the short length of the bathroom.  _Be honest_.  “I’m tied down,” he muttered, not able to look at Cathal.  “And I’m being fucked, and it…” He dug his fingers into his eyes, trying not to remember the next part.  “And then all of a sudden, I’m…I’m not tied anymore, and I’m the one doing the fucking, and I look down and it’s a corpse.”  
  
“Who was it?” Cathal asked after a pause.  
  
“Tonight it was my cousin.”  He deliberately avoided her name, but it didn’t matter; as soon as the words were out his stomach twisted again and he lunged for the toilet.  There was nothing left to bring up and he retched painfully against emptiness.  When he was through, Cathal wrapped him in his arms, kneeling next to him on the floor.  He found himself melting into the hold with a vague sense of surprise at the ease of it.  
  
After several minutes, Cathal helped him to his feet and kept his arm around him while he washed out his mouth, then guided him into bed.  He fell back asleep with his head on Cathal’s chest, listening to the steady strong rhythm of his heart, and if he dreamed again he did not remember.  
  
*****  
  
Cathal was oddly relieved when Aedion called for them to make camp rather than pushing on to Orynth that night.  He felt like he should have been glad to return to the city where he had spent so much of his adult life, where he had met Aedion.  Instead all he could think of was the quarter of the city full of ghosts.  The ghosts of Muire, of his innocence, of his faith in the gods, his faith in the might of his country; they all hovered in the streets surrounding the small house he still owned.  The ghost of his sanity, too.  With every step Chance took towards the city walls, he could feel the ground beneath him crumbling and he didn’t know how to step away from the precipice.  
  
He couldn’t tell if Aedion noticed.   Things had just started to feel comfortable between them again when the summons had come.  The Bane was required to be in Rifthold by the end of the summer, giving them six weeks to get a thousand men hundreds of miles to the south.  Aedion had sent false information to Adarlan concerning their numbers, which meant a third of the force was being left behind.  Another hundred were being divided among the major cities, to “maintain order,” Aedion had declared in the letter he sent south.  To take over control from Adarlan’s forces, in reality.  
  
Aedion was playing with fire, but that was nothing unusual.  Only the stabbing pain Cathal felt in his chest when he thought of Aedion facing the King—the man who had taken everything from him, from them both—was new.  He still couldn’t tell if it was terror or rage.  
  
As they had every night, Aedion and Cathal sat among the men, telling jokes and stories, tales of the fae, of magic, of the power that had once filled this land but had been banished from these shores for over four years now.  Once they crossed into Adarlan, all such topics were banned. Even Orynth was probably unsafe; so they celebrated this last night of remembrance.  It felt like the night before a battle.  
  
Cathal retired to the tent early, hoping sleep would chase away that sick unsteady feeling.  Aedion followed shortly afterwards, gathering him up so tenderly Cathal knew he could somehow sense it.  Though the close proximity to the entire company prevented them from more distracting activities, laying in Aedion’s arms was enough.    
  
“What’s wrong?” Aedion murmured in his ear.  
  
“I don’t want to go back there,” Cathal whispered.  
  
“To Orynth?”  
  
“Mmm.”  Cathal pressed a kiss to Aedion’s shoulder.  “It’s been…good, to be away.”  
  
“We won’t be there long.”  Aedion heaved a sigh that was probably heard at the far end of camp.  “I’m a bit torn about it myself.”  
  
Cathal thought about how ragged Aedion had seemed in the weeks they’d spent in the city, how he had admitted to not sleeping.  At the time, Cathal had attributed it all to the stress of  trying to raise the Bane, but now he wondered.  After all, he was not the only one with phantoms in his past.  With gentle lips, he kissed Aedion into sleep and soon followed.  
  
The morning dawned with soft rain and gray skies that somehow made every color richer.  Somehow Cathal had forgotten how beautiful the landscape was around the city, how brilliant the green with the rich purple of the early heather beginning to dot the foothills.  The mountain loomed behind them, a stalwart guard over the city.  The glazed white walls rose before them and the men at the gate snapped to attention as they realized who was approaching.  Aedion rode on ahead to greet them, Cathal and Kelso cursing in unison and kicking their horses after to maintain their guard.    
  
Once they reached the gate, Cathal realized they needn’t have bothered.  One of the men Aedion had brought from Adarlan was grinning broadly up at him, and Aedion dismounted to pull the man into an embrace.  Kelso raised his eyebrows at Cathal.  He wasn’t sure why Kelso seemed so surprised; then again, he hadn’t seen Aedion with them before.     
  
Aedion talked with the man—Dorsey, Cathal thought his name was—while the rest of the Bane gathered in the grassy area in front of the gates.  Heads turned and an eerie quiet fell as Aedion led his men into the city and through the square.  While many people inclined their heads or bowed at the sight, there were many more faces who watched with resentment, betrayal, fury.  They should have anticipated this, Cathal realized.  Rumors of a rebel force had long ebbed and flowed through the city, giving hope when citizens had been rounded up by the wagonload for the noose.  Now it had been conquered by Aedion, and these people had no way of knowing if it had truly been in Adarlan’s name or his own.    
  
They reached the garrison and filed onto the practice field, overwhelming the few men who were there.  One of them broke away and approached.  Raedan.  Everyone on horseback dismounted as a unit while the foot soldiers filled in the spaces.  Cathal pushed through to where Aedion and Raedan were talking, faces serious.  
  
“No,” Aedion was saying, “absolutely not.”  
  
“You don’t have a choice, Aedion,” Raedan said.  “The King ordered it.  It’s done.”  
  
Cathal cleared his throat and they both started.  “What are you two arguing about?”  
  
“The King ordered that we open the barracks at the palace for the Bane to stay when in the city,” Raedan answered, though he didn’t take his eyes off Aedion’s face.  “Just the barracks and the stables, the rest is still closed off, I swear.”  
  
Aedion looked pale beneath the tan that weeks of training and traveling under the sun had given him.  “The people are already livid about the battle, I can’t just go in there and take over the palace too.”  
  
“As far as they’re concerned, you already have.  We opened it a week ago to prepare.”  
  
Aedion cursed creatively and at length.  Raedan and Cathal let him go until his voice started to raise.  Then Cathal took his arm and dragged him as subtly as possible around the corner of the hall, not looking to see if Raedan was following.  “What’s the real problem?” Cathal asked mildly once they were out of earshot of everyone.  
  
Aedion bristled, then sagged back against the wall, rubbing his hands over his face.  “I’m not sure I can go back there,” he finally said, the words muffled by his palms.  
  
“Why not?”  
  
Aedion dropped his hands, and Cathal was startled to see the depth of the grief in them.  “The last time I saw them was there.  We were having dinner with the King and the King’s spoiled rotten son.  Aelin…”  His voice cracked and Cathal felt like his heart was getting wrenched out of his chest.  “Aelin had some sort of a fit, I don’t know what set her off but she lost control.  She would have killed him.  Hell, she probably would’ve killed all of us, so Evalin knocked her out.  They decided it was safer to leave after, and they wouldn’t let me come.”  He gave a bitter laugh.  “They should’ve let her burn the whole gods-damned place to the ground.”  
  
Cathal had no idea what to say.  He didn’t know if Aedion thought he could have somehow protected the Galathynius family from whatever assassins the King had sent, or if he simply wished he could have died with them.  Either way he understood too well why Aedion didn’t want to go near the palace.  “I haven’t been back to the house Muire and I lived in,” he offered.  “I can’t even go to that section of the city.  I lived here for three years afterwards, more or less, and I never set foot within a quarter mile of it.  I still own it, technically.”  Cathal glanced around; no one had followed them.  He reached up to cup Aedion’s jaw.  “It seems we both have ghosts to confront here.”  
  
Aedion leaned into the touch, but his eyes were far away.  “Maybe we shouldn’t confront the ghosts,” he murmured.  “Maybe we should embrace them.”  
  
That had never seemed possible before.  Cathal had never been strong enough.  “Let’s introduce each other to our ghosts then,” he said finally.  “I’ll take you to my house, and you can show me the palace.”  
  
“We’re pathetic, aren’t we,” Aedion murmured, pressing a quick kiss to Cathal’s palm.  He pushed off the wall and headed back to his men, his posture changing as he walked until by the time he entered the field he was the solid colonel his men were used to.    
  
An hour later, they had broken away from the rest of the men who were being guided to the palace grounds by Raedan and the rest of the Adarlanian officers.  Cathal had not been able to afford a home in the really nice neighborhoods, but they hadn’t lived in the slums either.  They passed the pub he had worked at for Clery and headed deeper into the residential section.  
  
Abruptly, Cathal’s feet just…stopped.  He had every detail of the fountain in the square before them memorized: the curve of the centerpiece, the carvings of the wolves’ heads and lilies around the base, the gentle sound of the water trickling down in a broad curtain.  Aedion stopped next to him with a questioning look.  Cathal took a shaky breath.  
  
“We used to come and sit here, even when the fountain was drained for winter.  We kept talking about bringing a picnic to eat here once it was warm enough, but she was gone before summer came.”  He could almost see her sitting there, wrapped up in her wool coat with her eyes bright with laughter above her scarf.  Aedion said nothing, just dropped a broad hand on his shoulder and squeezed gently.  It was enough.  
  
For the first time in three years, Cathal stepped into the square.  He was not alone; he had not just Aedion with him, but Muire and Luthias, and all his other friends who had fallen.  And he knew, somehow he knew, that they rejoiced to see him return.    
  
When they reached his little house he was startled to see it in good repair, with flowers blooming in the tiny garden and lights and laughter shining from within.  Dimly he recalled Clery talking to him about letting the house to a family who had lost all.  He must have agreed, though that memory was lost.    
  
_It should have been us_ , he thought.  They should have been the ones to plant the flowers and fill the bird bath, to find sturdy wooden chairs to lounge in on fine days, to be playing with their children in the tiny living room while the light rain fell.  He didn’t realize that it wasn’t the rain alone dampening his face until Aedion drew him against his chest and the first sob shuddered out of him.  As he wept, he found the ground solidifying under his feet, the precipice before him shrinking.  They stood there in the shadows, watching the figures cross in front of the windows, and finally Cathal said good-bye.  
  
*****  
  
In the end, it was the image of Cathal squaring up to the fountain that finally spurred Aedion to enter the palace grounds.  The last time he had seen them, they had been cold and silent; the time before that, full of Adarlanian soldiers and the screams of innocents.  Himself included; he could still feel the burn in this throat as he had been dragged off to be locked into the tower.  
  
This time, the green was carpeted with men, his men, chattering and laughing despite their fatigue.  They were giving the palace itself a wide berth, gathering mostly near the enormous stone barracks that abutted the stables.  It felt oddly right to see dozens of horses’ heads popping out of the stalls as he approached, a curious line of gray and bay and chestnut with hay dangling out of their mouths.  He rubbed Marcra’s neck and felt the creature roiling in his gut quiet just a little.  
  
He walked with Cathal across the immaculate grounds in silence, allowing himself to remember.  Somehow their scents were wafting in the wind: the spring rain of Evalin, the rich earth of Rhoe, the heather smell of Orlon, the oak of Quinn.  Only Aelin’s flame was missing.    
  
They reached the back of the palace with the unassuming door that led into the kitchen that he had always used like his own personal corridor.  He saw the padlock on the door and turned away, somewhat glad for the excuse not to enter.  
  
“Are you going to go in?” Cathal asked, his quiet voice splintering the silence.  
  
“It’s locked.”  
  
Cathal snorted, sounding like himself for the first time in two days.  “That’s never stopped me before.”  
  
Damnit.  He froze, torn between feeling like a coward and feeling like he was intruding on something he had no right to, not anymore.  
  
“You don’t have to decide now,” Cathal said.  “We’ve got a few days here.  But if you want to, I’d be a sorry picklock if I couldn’t get you in.”  
  
Aedion nodded stiffly.  They headed back to the barracks and the impromptu party that seemed to be starting as people from the city joined the soldiers inside the walls.  
  
It was a relief when they finally stumbled into the inn long after darkness had fallen.  Aedion collapsed fully-dressed on the bed, utterly wrung out.  Cathal headed straight for the bathing room.  “I take back every uncharitable thought I had about Raedan today,” he said, stopping in the doorway.  Aedion groaned and pushed himself up to go see.  
  
The bathing room was luxurious, with fluffy white towels and a deep bathtub with gleaming taps that Cathal turned to start hot water tumbling in.  Fancy soaps and lotions lined the tub.  “It’s still not big enough for both of us,” Aedion grumbled.  
  
Cathal laughed as he stripped off his shirt.  “If you weren’t the size of a horse, it would be.”  
  
Aedion watched him undress, the tattooed birds on his shoulder almost seeming to take flight with the ripple of muscle.  His left arm and hand were still several shades paler than the rest of him.  Evidently a week without the splint was not enough to erase the evidence of his injury.  As soon as he was naked, Aedion yanked him against his body.  “I am glad he got us a room,” he murmured against Cathal’s temple.    
  
“I think he didn’t want the men to have to listen to us fucking.”  
  
“Smart man.”  They had barely touched each other while traveling here, the usual problem with close quarters and thin canvas tents.  His arms tightened around Cathal; he longed for a lengthy stretch of time together in one place, but that was likely months or years away depending on the King’s wishes.  Reluctantly Aedion released him to his task.  
  
By the time Aedion toweled himself off, Cathal was sprawled out on the bed asleep, damp hair soaking into the pillowcase.  Aedion crawled in next to him, trying not to wake him.  He couldn’t help but smile when dark eyes blinked at him and the corner of Cathal’s mouth twitched up.  Nor could he hold back his sigh when Cathal’s hands reached for him and pulled him close.  
  
Need won out over fatigue for them both.  Aedion rocked within him, unable to keep his mouth from Cathal’s for more than a gasped breath as he drove them both slowly, inexorably towards climax.  Afterwards, as he brushed Cathal’s sweaty hair back off his forehead, he wondered how it was that he finally felt home.  
  
“I don’t know how to reconcile it,” Cathal murmured later into the darkness.  Aedion pushed sleep away and waited.  “I loved her so much, loved them both so much.  And I miss them, I do.  But if I still had them, I wouldn’t have you.”  He gave a shaky sigh and Aedion pressed a kiss to his temple.  “And if someone were to give me a choice…I don’t know how to reconcile it,” he said again.  
  
Aedion knew exactly what he meant.  If he had been able to keep Aelin and Rhoe and Evalin and Quinn and Orlon, he would never have had Delaney and Raedan and Mikkal and Cathal.  Most of all Cathal.  “I think the gods try to keep a balance,” he finally said.  “They can’t stop the bad from happening, but they try to give us something to make up for it.”  
  
Cathal was quiet beside him.  “I can’t bring myself to believe in the gods anymore,” he finally said.  
  
“I can’t bring myself to stop.  So much power and magic and evil in the world…” He trailed off, not sure how to finish the sentence.  
  
“Whatever force it was, if it was the gods or coincidence or sheer dumb luck, whatever brought us together, I’m grateful.”  Cathal’s voice was almost reverent, and he kissed Aedion on each cheek and then lightly on the mouth.  Aedion drifted off into a dreamless sleep, waking only to the clear light of morning.  
  
*****  
  
“I told you,” Fulke snapped, “I don’t know.  He was ordered to bring the Bane, and it’s anyone’s guess if your brother is included.  I doubt even Clery knew when he sent the letter.”  
  
Mikkal gave Delaney a sympathetic look that did nothing to soothe her rising temper.  It was his last night in Adarlan, and she wasn’t sure why he was spending it here.  She was well aware he had a lover or two stashed away in the city; telling, she thought, that he wasn’t with them.  
  
It was Maida who was going to miss Mikkal the most, Delaney decided, and probably vice versa.  She had clung to him even more than she had to Aedion, and he had given her nothing but kindness in return.  It worried Delaney a little, what Maida would do without her friend.  
  
Some part of her had expected Mikkal would change his mind when the announcement came that Aedion was expected late summer, with his Bane.  But he had held fast to what he had said to Cherise.  She still didn’t understand, but the haunted look in his amber eyes kept her from asking.     
  
It seemed impossible that Aedion would be in this city in a few short weeks; even more impossible that it had been over two years since she had seen him.  Sometimes it felt like he was a fictional character she had made up in her head; other times like just days ago they were teasing each other, holding each other together as the camp sought to break them both.  She wondered if they would get a chance to see each other.  If he would even remember her.    
  
Mikkal was silent as they walked back to their apartment.  “You really have to go?” she asked, wistful in a way she rarely allowed herself to be.  
  
He wrapped an arm around her shoulders and pressed a kiss to her hair.  “I guess I don’t really have to, honey, but I want to.  I’m not sure I can be my own person here.”  
  
Did he even know what that was?  He had belonged to his father, then the King.  Now he was drifting, vaguely buoyed by the loud girls overwhelming the apartment but she had never seen him on solid ground.  She never would.  And Aedion…she didn’t know if he was just another tether to sever, or if he was quicksand Mikkal feared he would drown in.  
  
Before she could blink, they were back at the apartment and saying good night for the last time.  Delaney let herself be lost in Cherise, in the feel and smell and taste of her.  There were tears in her eyes and Cherise kissed them away.  “He’s going to be fine,” Cherise murmured.  
  
Delaney wanted to explain that the tears were from gratitude, not sadness; gratitude that her life had led her here, that somehow she had been protected from the horrors of violence and loss that had nearly drowned so many others.  That she had been a spectator, but never a participant, until now, until love had found her.  
  
Raised voices in the living room penetrated the door before she could speak.  She and Cherise exchanged glances, then got out of bed to listen at the door.    
  
“How is that love?” Avis was nearly yelling.  “How can you tell me that you loved him, and then run away?”  Avis’s voice broke, and with it Delaney’s heart.  She opened the door.  
  
“What’s going on?” Delaney asked, taking in Avis’s red face and Mikkal’s guarded expression.  “Why are you waking all the neighbors?”  
  
Avis spun on her heel and went into her room, slamming the door.  Delaney flinched on Maida’s behalf but didn’t try to follow her.  Mikkal dropped onto the couch, abruptly looking wearier than Delaney had ever seen him.  Cherise studied him for a moment then disappeared into the kitchen.  The sounds of the kettle being filled and mugs clinking gently against the countertop reached them.  
  
“What happened?”  
  
Mikkal shrugged.  “I’m not sure.  I couldn’t sleep, so I was reading in here.  She came out and asked if I was really leaving in the morning.  When I said yes, she just…”  He sighed.  “I think she’s equating me with the bastard who knocked her up.  But it’s not like that.”  
  
“I know.”  
  
“Gods, if Aedion had been a virgin I never would’ve touched him, but he sure as hell wasn’t.”  
  
Delaney squirmed a little, but Mikkal didn’t notice.  “She adored him,” she said to distract herself.  “I think it’s hard for her to imagine that he might be all right with moving on.”  
  
“I think it’s because she still wants to believe in love,” Cherise said from behind them.  She handed them each a cup of tea and a scone and settled down on the chair across from them.  “She thinks if you and Aedion can end up together, then it means she and that bastard officer can.”  
  
Delaney sipped at her tea, trying to swallow down the nausea at that idea.    
  
“She can’t really want that,” Mikkal said, voicing Delaney’s thoughts.  “After everything that happened?”  
  
Cherise shrugged.  “She’s young.”  
  
They sat in silence for a long time.  “I hate that she thinks of me like that,” Mikkal finally said.  
  
“Maybe Aedion can help, when he’s here.”  
  
“Do you really think you’ll see him?” Cherise asked in surprise.  “I bet he’s going to be in high demand.”  Delaney batted her eyes at Cherise, earning an exasperated look.  “Fine.  I’ll see what I can do, but I make no promises.  We can’t be too obvious about it, either, with the King’s spies everywhere.”  
  
Somehow they started talking about Wendlyn.  Cherise told Mikkal what she knew about Varese, he talked about what his contact had suggested.  Delaney stayed quiet.  She wanted to ask Mikkal what he hoped to accomplish.  He was running from the King, yes; but not the King alone.  She wondered if he would find the peace he sought, or if the battle he was fighting with himself would follow.  
  
*****  
  
Mikkal stood on the deck of the ship.  Even anchored, it bobbed and rolled under his feet but he found he loved the feeling.  As a child, he had taught himself to ride his pony while standing on his back, and it felt a bit like that.  A clean wind blew in, bringing the tang of salt.  He closed his eyes and inhaled deeply.  
  
When he opened them to the ringing of a bell, he saw Delaney and the girls waving from the dock.  They had insisted on coming to see him off, even Avis.  She was pale as she looked up at him now, but unlike Delaney and Maida her eyes were dry.  He couldn’t help but smile and wave back.  
  
That morning he had pulled Cherise aside and asked two last favors.  She had smiled at him and kissed him on the cheek before walking away.  Though she hadn’t said yes, he knew she would do as he asked.    
  
Somehow it was all a little more bearable, knowing she was with them now he was gone.  
  
The bell rang again and the sailors who had been untying the ropes scrambled onto the ship.  There was a groan and a shift under him as the anchor lifted, then the splashing of oars as they began to row out.  Canvas snapped as the sails unfurled and he watched as the girls shrank until they were part of the wood of the dock, part of the shore, part of the coastline.  Until they were indistinct from the country he was leaving behind, three fragments of his heart surrendered to his past.  
  
*****  
  
Aedion was ready to strangle Clery.  
  
He refrained only because he was pretty sure Delaney would be mad at him.  Maybe Cathal too, though judging by his expression he might join in instead.  
  
“You are not convincing,” Clery said for seemed like the fiftieth time, swirling his wine.  “Nobody believes that you are in this for Adarlan.  They don’t even believe you’re in it for yourself.”  
  
“I don’t see why that’s a bad thing,” Cathal said.  “Since he killed Millar, we need the people to believe he’s on Terrasen’s side.”  
  
“No, we don’t.  I don’t give a shit what the average person on the streets thinks.  They’ll benefit from your actions whether they know it or not.  But Adarlan will kill you if you don’t sell this better.  You can’t keep giving people money and talking to them about their petty concerns, Aedion.  That is not your job here.”  
  
“Hear that, Aedion?” Raedan piped up for the first time.  “You’re not enough of an arrogant asshole.”  
  
Aedion put his hand over his heart.  “That might be the nicest thing anyone’s ever said to me.”  
  
“This isn’t funny,” Clery snapped.  
  
“You’re right,” Aedion growled.  “It isn’t funny at all.”  
  
Clery seemed to sense he was pushing too hard.  “I’m sorry, I am.  I know it’s difficult.  But you need to realize how far gossip travels.”  
  
“Fine.  Next time a poor person comes up to me I’ll just trample them with Marcra.  It’s not like they matter as much as kissing the King’s ass.”  
  
“They don’t.”  Clery held up his hand.  “Don’t start.  You told me you understood this.  Over a year ago, when all this first started, you sat at this table and you said you knew the game you were playing.”  
  
“I do.”  
  
“So stop acting like an idealistic child and play it.”  
  
Aedion hacked savagely at his meat for a moment.  Cathal’s knee pressed against his and he stuffed a too-large forkful into his mouth and chewed.  _I need you to promise me that you will learn how to lie_.  Almost the last words Mikkal had said to him.  He had agreed, but he had not really kept that promise.  Manipulate people, that he could do and had; but he had never found lying easy.  By the time he was able to swallow, the haze of fury had faded.  “I understand.”  
  
Clery nodded.  “Good.”  He looked like he wanted to say something more but thought better of it.  “Good,” he said again, then turned back to his food.  
  
They finished the meal planning how to divide up the force and discussing what they might expect in Rifthold.  It all seemed peaceful until it was time to leave and Clery asked Aedion to stay back.  
  
“Shit,” Cathal and Raedan muttered in unison.  They looked at Aedion for guidance and he nodded at them so they left, Cathal glancing behind him as the door closed.  
  
“You need to be careful about Cathal.”  
  
Aedion felt the heat rise in his face and he clenched his fists in his lap.  “I’m not going to hurt him.”  _Again, at least_ , he thought, picturing his split lip and bloody nose.  
  
“That’s not what I meant.  I meant with the King.  It’s a little too obvious that he is more to you than an officer in your army.”  
  
The snarl rose up his throat.  “I’m not going to deny what he means to me.”  
  
To Clery’s credit, he only looked mildly uncomfortable and his voice was stern when he replied.  “Those are the words of an idealistic boy, Aedion.  You can’t afford to be that right now.”  
  
“What do you want me to do, give him up?”    
  
“No, I don’t want that for either of you.  I can see what you’ve done for him, and I’m grateful for it.”  Clery sighed.  “But you need to act more like you don’t care, in public at least.  Raedan’s right, even if he was being sarcastic.  You need to be an arrogant prick if you want to sell this.”  Clery leaned across the table, hands flat against the cloth.  “You need to sell this, Aedion.”  
  
Cathal was waiting on the street, no surprise.  Aedion was silent on their walk back to the inn.  He had no idea how to do this, how to hide the one part of himself he respected.  But Clery was right, the bastard.  No matter how much Aedion hated it, he couldn’t ignore it.  
  
Much later, lying sated with Cathal in his arms, he murmured, “Clery thinks I need to hide the way I feel about you.”  
  
“Mmm.  Raedan said the same thing.”  Of course he did.  Aedion breathed out a silent growl and Cathal chuckled as he nestled in closer.  “I trust Clery more than anyone in the world, except you.  If he and Raedan are on the same page, we probably need to listen.”  
  
They were silent for a long time, but sleep would not come, even after Cathal’s breathing had smoothed and his body had gotten heavier.  Aedion breathed in the warm scent of him and let his thoughts swirl.  
  
*****  
  
Cathal had no idea why they were doing this in broad daylight.  It didn’t help that the lock was stiff with rust and neglect.  He should’ve brought some oil, but the only kind he had was for a very different purpose.  Though it would probably work, he thought with some amusement as the last pin finally gave way and the lock opened.  
  
Aedion pushed the door open slowly, feet riveted to the floor.  A dozen breaths passed before he took a reluctant step across the threshold.  Cathal followed him down the narrow hallway and they ended up in an enormous kitchen that must have once been the heart of this palace.  Empty, it more resembled a bone gnawed clean.    
  
From there they passed through a great dining hall and a drawing room, furniture covered by cloths.  Cathal’s nose tickled as they walked over the carpets, dust swirling up in a fury over being disturbed.  Aedion was moving like he was being pulled on a string, not sparing a glance at the art that hung on the walls or ornate carving of the staircase.  Up in the family quarters, he passed by what seemed like dozens of closed doors.  Cathal shoved down his curiosity about what hid behind those doors and stayed a step behind Aedion, one hand on his sword hilt and the other on his dagger.  
  
There were beautiful carved double doors at the end of the hall and Aedion didn’t hesitate before throwing them open.  The furniture was covered and there was an area of the polished floor that was darker than the rest, as if it had long been covered by a rug that had been removed.  Aedion stared at that spot before dragging his eyes away to scan the edges of the room.  
  
“What are you looking for?” Cathal asked, shattering the silence like glass.  
  
“The sword of Orynth.”  Aedion walked hesitantly towards one section near the bed.  Cathal recognized the outline of an empty sword rack.  “Darrow told me the King had taken it, but I wanted to see for myself.”  He ran his fingers along the ancient wood, removing the dust to reveal curves glossy with the patina of a thousand touches.  
  
An odd shiver crawled up Cathal’s back.  He was an intruder here; nobody of his background should have been within a hundred feet of this room.  But Aedion…he fit.  There was no question he had been raised here.  He never should have had to leave.  
  
Aedion circled the room.  It was interesting, cataloguing the things he touched.  The small desk, yellowing paper still stacked atop it.  A faded chair with a book dropped on it so the arm marked a page.  A wardrobe with an elaborate inlay of a stag.  _The_ stag, the Lord of the North.  A broad finger traced the antlers, then Aedion turned away.  “We should go.”  
  
Cathal started to leave, but stopped in the doorway when Aedion did not move to follow.  “Do you…”  Aedion sniffed the air.  “Do you smell that?”  
  
Cathal mimicked him, catching nothing the but the faint cloying odor of neglect.  “I smell mildew, that’s it.”  
  
Aedion spun, still scenting like a hound.  He stopped over the unworn section of floor.  “There’s something metallic, here.  It’s faint, but it’s strange.  Not blood,” he added after glancing at Cathal’s face.  With a quick shake of his head and roll of his shoulders he strode out of the room, Cathal on his heels.  
  
Cathal wondered which of the rooms they passed had been Aedion’s and which his cousin’s.  Aedion stopped in front of one, staring at the tarnished silver handle of the door but not making a move to open it, and Cathal guessed at least one of his questions had been answered.  
  
A shout caught their attention, and they turned in unison to see a florid-faced man scurrying up the stairs.  Cathal did not recognize him, but Aedion straightened up with a vaguely amused expression.  “You can’t be in here!” the man yelled, indignant.  
  
“And who has a greater right to be here than I do, Arailt?” Aedion asked, arrogance suffusing his tone.  Cathal kept his own face impassive and watched in silence.  
  
The man pulled up abruptly and gaped at him for a moment.  “Prince Ashryver,” he stammered out, bowing.  “I didn’t realize…The lock had been picked.  You could have come and asked, we would have let you in.”  
  
“I didn’t wish my visit to be known.”  
  
“My apologies, Prince.”  Arailt bowed again, giving an excellent view of the sunburned top of his head.    
  
“Leave,” Aedion ordered, his voice like soft thunder.  Arailt stammered something unintelligible as he turned and obeyed.  
  
Once he was out of earshot, Cathal cleared his throat.  “Is that what Prince Ashryver was like?”  
  
Aedion gave a crooked smile that was breathtaking in its sadness.  “Sometimes, though I got my ears boxed for it.  Usually I was good to the staff, but Arailt was always a bit of a slimy bastard.  He was Orlon’s steward’s assistant, and Rhoe thought he was skimming.  Figures he was one of the ones who survived.”  
  
There were too many layers to that for Cathal to dissect in the moment.  This had to be the role Aedion was going to play; if perhaps, more than the sword, this was what Aedion had needed to find here.  With a last glance at the closed door of Aelin Galathynius’s room, Aedion squared his shoulders and raised his chin.  Each step down the stairs was deliberate, measured.  At the bottom, he brushed Cathal’s fingers briefly with his own and pressed his lips against his temple.    
  
“I don’t want to be this man,” Aedion murmured.  “I don’t want our men to think that’s who I am.”  
  
“We know who you are, Aedion.  Play whatever role you have to to get through the next two months.  We’ll stand by you.”  I”ll stand by you.  
  
When he exited the palace, Prince Aedion Ashryver reclaimed his title, his men kneeling before him with a joyous shout.


	25. Chapter 25

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I can't believe this took me 7 months to finish, and honestly I split the chapter as this is almost 10k words and there is still a LOT more to cover of Aedion's first visit to Rifthold. I hope it was worth the wait for all of you! Thanks to @nikotheamazingspoonklepto for the last minute beta of a fic for a fandom they don't even belong to... And the biggest thank you in the world to Gabi and Lyn for being my cheerleaders and keeping at me in the nicest way possible to finish this!
> 
> NSFW.

Cathal remembered these woods.

He remembered the fading whispers of the trees talking to each other; the twisting roots and moss-covered rocks; the leaves, bright as jewels, hanging overhead.  There was a twisting pain in his chest as he thought of the last time he was here, one of thousands preparing to make their last stand against certain slaughter. Even now, years later, there was a solemn hush as the Bane passed through.  

It felt like the trees remembered too.  Branches bowed above them, honoring the fallen, and Cathal felt a strange sort of peace steal through him.  His friends, his comrades-in-arms, had not been forgotten. Luthias had not been forgotten, not here.

Chance plodded along behind an unusually settled Marcra. Cathal had no idea where Aedion was taking them, only that they would rejoin the Bane in a day or two. The path seemed to open up before them of its own accord, the horses’ hoofbeats nearly silent on the cushion of moss and pine needles. 

In the late afternoon the surroundings became painfully familiar. Cathal could practically hear the ghosts of the men he had known laughing and singing with the fatalistic acceptance that seemed universal among soldiers. “Why?” he choked out, the word scraping his throat like ground glass.

Aedion glanced at him over his shoulder and reined Marcra to a stop.  “You said you didn’t know where Luthias was buried,” he said, so quietly Cathal had to strain to hear him.  “Grant told me about this place, and I thought...”

Cathal managed a tight nod when Aedion trailed off.  He nudged Chance onward; if they stopped for even a moment longer he was going to lose his nerve.  Riding so close their knees were brushing, they followed the trail around a bend and up a hill Cathal would have known in his sleep.  At the crest, they stopped; the field below was dotted with simple squares of stone, many with pebbles stacked atop them. Cathal dismounted, landing on feet so numb he nearly stumbled.  Aedion dropped to the ground next to him, taking the reins from his unresisting fingers. While Aedion picketed the horses, Cathal made his way forward like an automaton. He wasn’t sure any force could have stopped him; he wasn’t sure if he could keep his legs moving forward.  

Name after name greeted him, some unfamiliar, some acquaintances and rivals, a few old friends.  With each step he grew hollower. It felt like he was leaving small fragments of himself behind at each passing grave.  Aedion caught up with him and handed him a palmful of small stones in a full palette of colors. He rolled them in his hand as he walked, memorizing the textures with his thumb.  

They walked together, scanning the rows, until his eyes were blurry from fatigue.  Finally, at the end of a row more than halfway through the expanse of stones, he saw it.

_ Luthias Breck _

_ Friend _

Cathal dropped to his knees, reaching forward with one hand to trace the letters.  Calloused fingers brushed through his hair then disappeared; Cathal missed their warmth, but he didn’t look away from the marker before him.  

It was light gray, polished, the words carved deep enough that they showed no sign of fading yet from the passage of time.  There was something inside Cathal that he hadn’t even known was there, something frozen colder than the ice the bards sang about from the dawn of the world.  As he ran his hand over the gloss of stone, still cool despite the late afternoon sun, he felt that brittle ice start to thaw.

_ Friend _ .  Cathal traced the word again.  it was the truest word to describe him; he had alway been that, for everybody.  Long before he had been Cathal’s first lover, he had been his first friend. Cathal wondered how many people had counted Luthias among their friends, and how many of those people lay now under stones etched with their own names.  He glanced down at the small rocks in his hand. One rough stone, white with speckles of peach and silver, felt warm and heavier in his hand than the others; he selected a shiny bronze-colored rock and a gray-blue one that was shaped like an oyster shell to go along with it.  With a deep breath, he leaned forward and placed them above the name on the marker.

_ “I wonder if anyone will ever come and lay stones on my grave,” Luthias had whispered to him, fifteen years ago in a snowy graveyard in Rosamel as they watched a family do just that with tears running down their cheeks.   _

_ “I will,” Cathal had replied. _

_ “No you won’t,” Luthias had chided him.  “We will die together.” _

_ Cathal could still remember Luthias’ cold fingers grasping his own, and the reassuring squeeze he had given.  “Together.” _

He thought maybe he murmured that last word aloud.  It was a strange thing, to think of how young they had been.  They had thought themselves so streetwise and jaded, but only youth would make a promise like that.     

There were so many things he wanted to say.   _ Thank you _ , and  _ I love you _ , and  _ you were my heart, and the best friend I could have had _ .  The words swirled in his throat, and he spread his hands out across the stone.  When he sighed, the unspoken words took flight, and peace settled around him. This was the way of the world, the ebb and flow of the living and dead; he was old enough to understand this now.  And Luthias would never be forgotten. As long as his stone rested here, someone would know his name.

When he turned to tell Aedion they could go, he found him frozen in front of a grave halfway down the row, staring at it with eyes that were too old.  Cathal crept to his side. The name on the marker stone was one he didn’t recognize but the devastation on Aedion’s face struck a familiar chord. Cathal let his hand brush lightly against Aedion’s fingers, and Aedion looked down at him, blinking as if he had forgotten who he was.  

With a deep shuddering breath, Aedion seemed to spool back into himself.  Cathal leaned against him and Aedion rested an arm across his shoulders, pulling him even closer.  “Quinn was one of my uncle’s men,” he murmured. “He was always kind to me. That last day, he…” Aedion swallowed audibly, and Cathal knew.  He had heard the story. When the young prince had disappeared, all that had left behind had been the bodies of the men who had been his guard.  

After another long moment Aedion released him and took a short step away.  The sun was dropping in the sky, turning all the markers to flame. They walked back to the horses shoulder to shoulder, not quite touching but Cathal could feel Aedion’s warmth on his skin.  “We should have brought the others,” he said, cracking the silence. “So they could see what we’re fighting for.”

Aedion shook his head.  “I thought about it. But with us going to Adarlan and needing to play the role of obedient soldiers, it’s too risky.”

Cathal almost laughed.  “And bringing me wasn’t?” 

A flicker of a smile crossed Aedion’s face.  “Grant asked me the same thing. I decided to take the risk.  I don’t know what’s going to happen down there, we might not get a chance later.”

With that, the brief lightening of the mood was gone.  They rode until night turned the forest into impenetrable black, then Aedion found a spot and they made camp.  It reminded Cathal of their first trip up through the Staghorns to Dewar’s camp, only this time they fell asleep curled into each other so tightly he didn’t know where he ended and Aedion began.     

*****

Trumpets blared as they approached the gates.  Marcra trembled beneath Aedion at the blast, and he rubbed a hand up his neck until he settled.  Aedion knew exactly how he felt. He reined in his own jitters with deep breaths.

Cathal and Grant rode on either side of him, stone faced, while Kelso bore the Adarlan standard just behind.  Raedan had volunteered, knowing how much the Bane detested that wyvern, but Kelso had insisted. Aedion did not ask him why, just looked at the fire burning in his eyes and nodded.

The gates were open.  A guard stepped out as Aedion neared, and he pulled Marcra into a halt.  “Colonel Ashryver. You are to proceed directly to the castle and ask for Brullo.  Your men will be kept on the grounds, and accommodations will be found for the officers.  You will meet with the King.”

“What, no escort of fine ladies?” Aedion said, with a cocky grin he didn’t feel.  “Or gentleman, if that is the preference in Rifthold? We’re not picky.”

Before the man could finish sputtering, he touched Marcra into a slow jog and the Bane poured into the streets of Rifthold.  After weeks of marching without bathing, he and his company reeked, but the stench of the streets surpassed them. People came out of buildings to watch them go, cheering the standard or cheering them, Aedion couldn’t tell.  He distantly remembered riding the streets of Orynth as a boy, surrounded by Rhoe and his men, Aelin on her sturdy pony by his side. He had grown used to the eyes on him then, but the years had washed away that familiarity. Instead his skin crawled.

Cathal legged Chance closer.  “I never expected this,” he said.  

Aedion gestured at the crowd with his chin.  “Should we give them a bit of a show?” At Cathal’s grin he pulled his sword and held it vertically in front of him.  In response, his men behind him drew their own and began beating them against their shields on every other step. The clash echoed like wild drums through the city, drawing more and more people out.  Marcra was nearly wild at the noise, bouncing up and down against the bit, sweat foaming up on his tightly arched neck. Only Aedion’s voice kept the horse together.

The palace loomed up in front of them, a ridiculous crystal structure looming over the high walls.  Aedion wondered how much of the coffers of conquered lands had gone into its construction. How many people had died by sword or starvation that this monstrosity could be built.  

At the palace gates he called for a halt and sheathed his sword.  As one man, the Bane followed suit. The guards looked slightly unnerved but quickly schooled their expressions.  Aedion risked a glance at Grant; it had been his idea, to spend the trek down practicing some showy maneuvers on the theory that everyone knew Adarlan loved a spectacle.  Grant’s face was impassive but Aedion could see a faint gleam in his eyes. One of the guards, wearing an elaborate wyvern pin on his uniform, approached. “Colonel Ashryver.  Follow me.” 

Halfway up the long, winding drive towards the castle, an older man and a boy joined them.  Aedion pulled up at the man’s motion and dismounted, handing a still wild-eyed Marcra to the boy.  The man introduced himself as Brullo and led him towards the barracks. “You should freshen up before you go before the King,” he said, almost apologetically.  

Aedion cleaned himself up as best he could shy of a full bath and changed into cleaner clothes and the decorated light armor Conor Shaw had made for him.  The leather base was covered with metal plates, beautifully carved by one of the other blacksmiths in swirls that somehow formed wolf heads. It seemed elaborate and unnecessary but the older officers had assured him it was appropriate for the ruse they were playing.  Buckling his sword belt, he rejoined Brullo. Another time, he would be interested in the elaborate gardens they walked through, but at the moment he was too occupied struggling with keeping his stomach out of his throat.

He could hear his pulse pounding in his ears, louder than their boots on the carpeted glass floor as they made their way through the halls.  Everything Grant and Cathal and Raedan had schooled him on during their trip rose to the surface, and by the time they reached the doors to the King’s meeting room, his mask of calm arrogance was firmly in place.  Brullo nodded to the room’s guards, the doors swung open, and they entered. There was a faint metallic odor to the room, not blood but something that tickled at his memory. Aedion’s gaze went immediately to the black-eyed murderer at the back of the room and he forgot all else.

“Colonel Ashryver,” the King boomed.  “Or do you prefer Prince?”

Aedion bowed, his muscles protesting the movement.  “You may call me whatever the hell you wish, Your Majesty,” he drawled, well aware of the dozens of eyes that snapped to him at his words or his tone.  “Personally, I think General Ashryver has a nice ring to it.”

The silence that followed his statement was absolute; not even the rustling of skirts could be heard.  Then the King threw back his head and laughed. Around the room people joined in, and Aedion barely restrained his shudder at the dissonant sound.  One man, to the King’s left, was unmoved. His dark humorless stare was oddly familiar and a chill crawled up Aedion’s spine. This must be Duke Perrington.  Aedion’s hand drifted towards his sword hilt and the effort to stay it had him gritting his teeth.

“I had heard you were a cocky son of a bitch,” the King said.  “I also heard you fought like a wild animal in that battle.” His eyes fell on Aedion’s armor.  “Or more like a whole pack of them.” The angle of his head had the King looking like a beast himself, more like one of the gargoyles Aedion had noticed adorning the walls and watchtower than anything that walked the earth in Erilea.  

“What boon would you claim as your reward for victory?”

Aedion had not expected that he would be offered any such thing; after all, when were slaves given gifts for their work?  But there was only once answer to give. “I would ask for the Sword of Orynth, Your Majesty.”

The King’s brow furrowed.  “And why would you claim that particular reward?”

“That the people of Terrasen may truly understand their master.  The man who carries that sword has long been the commander of Terrasen’s forces.  The symbol of Your Majesty giving it to me will not go unnoticed.”

There was a long pause while the King studied him with fathomless eyes.  It took every ounce of self-discipline not to fidget. “Very well,  _ General _ Aedion Ashryver.  You shall claim your reward at a feast that will be held in honor of your victory in four days.” 

Aedion bowed again, forcing a feral grin at his new title.  “Thank you, Your Majesty.”

“You are expected to be here every morning for meetings.  A schedule will be provided. Accommodations have been made for you and your officers in town.  Show my people a good time, Ashryver.”

“Yes, Your Majesty.”  With a final bow, Aedion was escorted from the room by a guard a few years older than himself.  His men had taken over one section of the enormous barracks, and there were shouts of greeting at his appearance, voices rich with relief.  Aedion nodded and clapped shoulders as he walked through his men. The officers fell in line behind him as he went, and then they were free of the building and walking down the long drive towards the gate.  Not a word was spoken until they were free of the palace grounds and being welcomed into an inn a few blocks away. 

His men crowded into his room, and as briefly as he could he told them of his meeting with the King.

“You requested the Sword of Orynth?” Grant asked, voice awed.  Aedion nodded. “And he agreed?”

“I may have sold him on it a bit.”

“You’re rutting brilliant,” Dewar said forcefully.  “I would never have dared.”

They talked for a few minutes more than clapped him on the shoulder as they dispersed to their rooms.  When it was only he and Cathal left, Aedion found himself sagging against the wall.

“You did well,” Cathal said quietly, coming over to stand in front of him.

“He certainly seemed to buy it.”

“You did well.”  Cathal reached up to tug him down into a kiss, and for a little while the horrors of that room, of those eyes on him, of that strange metallic stench and the words that were snares, were driven away.

*****

She perched on the rooftop and watched the men below, the crowd parting around them like a river around a boulder.  His golden hair shone in the summer sun, making him easy to track through the city. Newly made General Aedion Ashryver, prince of Wendlyn and the King of Adarlan’s prized possession.

There was a familiar arrogance to the angle of his chin, one she recognized from the mirror.  The faint echo of his laugh reached her ears, and she wondered what his companions had said. The acid of hatred crawled up her throat and she snarled silently before she leaped to the next rooftop to follow.

He stopped abruptly, head craning back, eyes searching the area where she flattened herself against the tiles.  Shit. Gods-damned fae senses; his always were better than hers. She had to be more careful. By the time she dared look, he was gone, his fair head bobbing more than a block away.  Cautiously, she followed until he reached the market square.

Ben found her there.  “Watching the young general, I see.”  She made a noncommittal noise. “Come on.  Arobynn wants to get out of the city until the heat breaks.”

He started to cross the roof, pausing at the peak.  “Why are you following him, anyway? Do you know him?”

She looked down one last time.  “No. I don’t know him.”  _ Not anymore _ .

*****

Three days had passed since the Bane had come, and Delaney still hadn’t seen Aedion or Raedan.  The only subject in the city was the arrival of the Bane, General Ashryver’s name the only one on everyone’s lips, but for all she could tell he was a ghost, a figment of rumor and imagination.  

Some of the tales had to be exaggeration.  One such story was going around, that he had driven a branch clean through an ash tree on a bet.  Another that he had bedded every woman in a town in one night. Tales of his prowess on the battlefield and in the bedroom rippled through the bakery until Delaney was driven nearly mad from the speculation and innuendo.

A minute or so before closing, the door jangled and she glanced up from where she was packing up the remains of the day’s products.  Her bland greeting died on her lips and she nearly dropped the box when she recognized Raedan. She rose slowly to her feet, her lungs too short of air to manage words, her heart beating into her fingertips.  He was looking at her with an expression she had never seen on his face before, and she suspected it was mirrored on her own.

Nell’s brisk greeting cut through Delaney’s haze.  “Can I help you?”

Raedan startled at the words and blinked a couple of times.  Before he could say something, Delaney finally found her voice.  “It’s all right, Nell, I’ve got this.”

Nell glanced at her, concern crinkling her forehead, but she obediently headed towards the back.  “If you’re sure, I’ll help finish up in back.”

Delaney thought she nodded; either way, Nell disappeared through the swinging door.  She wasn’t sure if it was her feet that moved, or Raedan’s, but the next thing she knew she was crushed in his arms.  He was tall enough now he could rest his cheek on the top of her head, and they stood like that for a long moment. She breathed in the scent of him, familiar and yet new, and realized that she had never believed she would see him again.  Her trembling fingers twisted tighter into his shirt and she blinked hard against the burning in her eyes.

Too soon, Raedan gently pulled away.  “I can’t stay long. We’re being watched.”

Delaney nodded, not trusting her voice yet.  She went back to the counter, digging her fingernails into her palms to try to stop her shaking.  Raedan followed, close enough behind that he stepped on her heel and she almost laughed. Turning, she found him smiling sheepishly.  “Some things never change,” she said.

“I can’t believe you’re really here,” he whispered.  “I mean, I knew it, but…” he trailed off, shaking his head.  

“I know.  I know, Raedan.”  Drawing a shaky breath she gestured to the food.  “What do you want?” He looked at her in confusion.  “You can’t come to a bakery and leave empty-handed.”

“Oh.  Right.  Uh, do they have any nut rolls?”

She bagged up three and he rooted around in his pockets.  It took all of her willpower to accept the coins he handed over, but she knew what game they were playing.  When he took the bag from her he leaned in. “There are dozens of parties, every night. Fulke gave us a list.”  He shook his head, a flash of the wonder he had had as a boy showing in his face. “We’re trying to split up to attend as many as possible.  Just not tomorrow.”

“I understand,” Delaney whispered, remembering the announcement of the banquet.  “I’ll see what I can manage.” She wondered if Cherise’s father was planning anything; most likely, from what she knew of him.  Perhaps there would be some way to get word to Raedan...

With a swift smile that was too old to belong to her baby brother, Raedan pushed through the door and was gone.  Slowly, Delaney boxed up the remaining goods, then went and locked the door. She couldn’t help but look out the window and wonder if anyone had seen them.  She found she didn’t care. It was worth it, those precious few minutes were worth any risk. Raedan was alive, he was alive and he was  _ here _ .

She walked home on high alert, working to keep her expression that of a normal harried worker while still listening for following footsteps.  Nobody seemed to notice her, she was as invisible as she had always been. Some might count that a curse, but she had always thought it a miracle.

The girls saw it in her face, the second she opened the door.  Maida squealed and hurled herself at her, and Delaney found herself swinging her sister around and around until they were both dizzy and Maida was breathless with laughter.  Avis was nearly vibrating by the time they stopped, though she affected nonchalance as she asked, “Did you see him?”

“Raedan,” Delaney confirmed, her cheeks hurting from smiling.  Maida hugged her a little tighter with an indistinct noise. “He found me at the bakery.  We couldn’t talk for long, but he’s going to try to arrange a meet up at one of the parties.”

“But Cherise said we can’t go to the parties,” Maida huffed, releasing Delaney and stepping away.  She and Avis crossed their arms and glared, and Delaney smothered a smile.

“No,” Delaney admitted.  “But we can plan something when we’re there.  It’s easier to talk and not be noticed when you’re with a hundred other people who are talking.”

The girls protested but the argument turned playful after a few more minutes, Maida presenting increasingly ridiculous ways for them to go unnoticed at the party.  Avis refused to laugh, but Delaney could see the twitches of her mouth as she fought to hide her smile. She wondered again what would have happened had the girls not been left behind.  Perhaps Avis still would have ended up thinking herself in love with the wrong person; perhaps she still would have been hurt. There was no protection to be offered for the pain of growing up, after all.  And she wondered what Aedion would think of her, would think of them all. It was impossible that he hadn’t changed through all of this, but she thought she would give almost anything just to see the warmth in his eyes again.  Maybe...maybe he could help Avis find her laugh wherever she had buried it. But that hope would have to wait, at least a few more days.

*****

Aedion took a deep breath as the doors to the Great Hall swung open.  Lifting his chin, he strode in, trusting his men to maintain formation.  Judging by the synchronicity of their footsteps, they did. Stopping before the dais, he bowed, holding the pose for just a second before raising his head to meet the King’s eyes.  

The King steepled his fingers and made a show of looking the soldiers over.  His men were dressed in uniform, as clean and pressed as if brand new, but they still paled in comparison to the finery of the court.  There was a gleam of satisfaction in the King’s expression, and mocking pity in the eyes of the minor royalty and courtiers scattered around the hall.  Aedion swallowed down the sting. They were soldiers, not courtiers, many pulled off the streets of Terrasen’s cities and the rest from the farms scattered throughout.  Yet they had answered Orlon’s call years ago, and still fought straight-backed for the protection of their land. Not one of the fine lords and ladies were fit to lick the boots of the lowest foot-soldier in the Bane, and he would make sure they knew that before he was done.

The Queen fanned herself, the gesture fussy and bored.  Next to her Prince Dorian sprawled in his seat, only the intensity of his stare belying the haughty grace of his pose.  A young man sat next to him, bolt upright in his seat and one hand resting on the pommel of his sword. Aedion flashed him a grin that was more of a dare.  The man’s mouth tightened in response, but he released his weapon. Just as well; somehow Aedion doubted bloodshed would win him any favors tonight.

“You will join me,” the King said, indicating the sole empty seat that was at the far end of the table.  A reminder of his place. “Your men may mingle.”

None of the Bane moved until Aedion glanced at them over his shoulder and made a small gesture with his chin.  Then it was like a dam breaking; a rush of noise and movement as the mass of men behind him dissipated into the crowd.  He could feel Cathal and Raedan’s eyes on him as he ascended and he wished they would turn away. The last thing he needed was for the King to know who was most valuable to him.

The King ignored him as he took his seat but the same could not be said for the various lords and ladies that made up the rest of the table.  The gods-damned Duke studied him in frank appraisal. There was an edge to it that Aedion did not understand, a sizing up that seemed to have little to do with gauging his prowess on the battlefield or his ability to lead men.  He almost looked like a hound scenting the wind, and Aedion’s skin crawled under the scrutiny.

The table was mounded with food, and servants ducked between seats to heap plates with meat and fish and the finest summer vegetables.  Aedion followed the lords’ example and dug into his meal, listening to the chatter and gossip around him. It didn’t take long for questions to be steered his way, condescension disguised as curiosity. 

It started simple, questions about the food, the city, the fancy dress of the citizens filling the hall.  Aedion dredged up the decade of court training he’d received in Terrasen and answered as politely as he could, though he let the arrogance that was also court-trained suffuse his tone.  

One middle-aged lord, halfway down the table, leaned back languidly in his seat.  “How does it feel to be the youngest general in Adarlan’s history?” he drawled. “Quite an honor, I should think.”

Aedion felt a wolfish grin spread across his face.  “So it would be, if it were true, but I’m afraid your information is mistaken.”

“Excuse me?”

“I am not the youngest person to be promoted to general.  I believe I’m...fifth, actually.” Every eye was trained on him now, even the King’s, but none so intently as the young prince’s.  His skin crawled under the scrutiny, under the familiar faint metallic smell that surrounded him, seeming to emanate from the people themselves.  “Surely you haven’t forgotten your own history.”

The man waved a dismissive hand.  “I wasn’t talking about Gavin’s time.”

“Neither am I.  Your own King’s grandfather was younger than I when he made general.”

“Nor did I mean royalty.”

Aedion’s grin sharpened.  “I was referring to the King’s maternal grandfather.  In truth, I have a greater claim to royalty than he did, at least until he married the younger daughter of a lord.”  Much of the finer details of the House of Havilliard’s history was buried, but Rhoe had insisted Aedion learn as much as he could about their neighbors to the south.  Grant had recommended he refresh himself before they left Orynth, and Aedion had not objected. Judging by the cold amusement in the King’s black eyes, and the stunned offense in that of the surrounding courtiers, the hour spent poring over the handful of books in the white palace had not been wasted.

The conversation turned away from him then, and he settled in to finish his meal in blessed peace.  Peace that didn’t last long before he felt a knee brush against his own. The lady in fine dress who sat next to him was smiling coquettishly up at him.  Lady Alienore, he believed she had been introduced as. She was beautiful, he supposed, or would be if it weren’t for the cosmetics lacquering her face. He stared at her for a brief moment before withdrawing his leg from hers and turning back to his food.

“You must know, General,” she murmured in what was supposed to be a sultry tone, “that your reputation precedes you.”

“I would certainly hope so,” he said, not bothering to pitch his voice low.  If she wanted to draw his attention, she may as well have to deal with everyone’s.  Though nobody turned towards them, he could still feel their focus.

Something traced up his ankle; her foot, clad in those ridiculous shoes the women wore.  “Not everyone believes the rumors,” she went on, her meaning as clear as the glass of the castle around them.  A year ago, he would have sprung at the opportunity she was offering him, even without knowing what the King or his court would think of him bedding one of their own.  But now...He imagined Cathal’s eyes on him.

“I don’t care what people believe, Lady,” he said.  “I know what I am.”

Her smile intensified, though she turned away to speak with the Queen.  A few minutes later, manicured fingers stole across his thigh. He debated breaking them, even as his cock stirred in his pants.  He willed it into obedience and grabbed the lady’s wrist, squeezing just hard enough to make her stutter in her speech before releasing it, watching the color rise up the back of her unpowdered neck.

The dinner passed without further incident.  There must have been some sort of hidden signal, for the hall fell suddenly silent a moment before a horn blared.  Everyone stood, save the table at which Aedion sat; then the people filling the hall dropped to one knee, a wave of movement.  Aedion glanced around at the lords and ladies; they were all looking at him, expressions ranging from expectation to disdain. A soldier, one of Adarlan’s, appeared at the King’s shoulder bearing a plain leather scabbard with a very familiar bone pommel jutting out of it.

At an impatient jerk of the Duke of Perrington’s head, Aedion got to his feet and moved to the King’s side.  For a split second, his knees refused to bend, but he forced himself to the ground next to the King’s chair through the wave of fury that threatened to swamp him.  Something in the King’s face made him think he knew; not all of it, perhaps, but at least what it was costing Aedion to kneel to him.

The cruel, icy smile that curved the King’s lips supported that theory.  When he spoke, his voice boomed out, echoing through the silent hall.

“In honor of your victory over the rebels of Terrasen, I hereby pronounce you General Aedion Ashryver, Wolf of the North.”  The King presented the ancient blade to Aedion, and his vicious smile broadened when he detected the faint tremor of Aedion’s hands as he reached for it.  “Do you pledge to continue to serve my people and my court with obedience?”

Aedion froze for a fraction of a heartbeat as his eyes met the King’s on the word  _ serve _ .  There was a taunt there, a challenge.  Layers of implication beneath the word. He couldn’t stop himself from glancing at the Duke and registering the smugness on his face.   _ He knows _ .  But then the King’s question was finished and he had to answer.

“I so pledge.”  He knew the King detected the faint note of rage in his voice, but it only seemed to serve to amuse him further.  It took every ounce of Aedion’s self control not to pull the sword from its scabbard the second it was in his hand and run it right through that broad chest, still strong despite the softening of age and lack of use.

Killing the King now would only bring down the full might of Adarlan on his country, and they were not prepared to withstand it.   _ Terrasen would not survive _ .  He chanted that silently in his head, over and over, as he slowly got to his feet, hand already memorizing the hilt of his uncle’s sword.  A thousand hands had wielded this in defense of Terrasen, and he would do no differently. 

There was something else, a small bag tied to the scabbard.  Aedion moved to untie it but a faint shake of the King’s head stopped him.  For later, then. He gave a curt nod in acknowledgement.

“You may join your men in the festivities,” the King said, quietly enough that only Aedion would hear.  “There is much pleasure to be had in my city, so I hear.” 

Another threat disguised as an offering.  His attention flicked to Lady Alienore; the King’s did the same, and he turned back to Aedion with a wyvern’s smile.  Aedion clenched his jaw until his ears popped, and with a faint bow he left the dais and returned to his men.

*****

Cathal had watched every moment of the farce of a celebratory dinner from his seat at one of the long tables that filled the hall.  Aedion seemed to acquit himself well, judging by the consternation that had rippled over the table and the King’s obvious entertainment at it all.  But though his expression seldom varied, Cathal could feel his tension rising, even from thirty yards away. There was a moment—a heartbeat, maybe two—when Aedion first touched the sword of Orynth that Cathal thought his control was cracking, but he reined it in with his usual iron grip and Cathal’s stomach returned to its normal location.

Not that he would’ve been better.  No; he would’ve had four crossbow arrows in him by now if he had been allowed anywhere near the King.  

Cathal’s breath came easier when Aedion finally, finally approached, heralded by a chorus of cheers and drinks raised in his direction, from the Bane and Rifthold soldiers alike.  There was no change in his bearing, and Cathal wondered if anyone else could see the strain. Raedan was visible at a nearby table, a drunken grin plastered across his face, but his eyes were momentarily sharp as they tracked Aedion’s movement.  So at least one other recognized how close the Wolf of the North was to unleashing hell.

Yet Aedion paused, clapping shoulders, talking, laughing, with his own men and those from Adarlan, the latter falling over themselves to raise their glasses in toast.  Cathal glanced up at the throne to see the King’s reaction. His attention was occupied by the man adjacent to him, and he seemed not to notice what was going on quite literally in front of his eyes.  Cathal went to turn back to Aedion, but his eye snagged on the young man seated next to the Queen. The Crown Prince. The boy’s eyes tracked Aedion’s every movement, and there was something in his face, something touched with sadness...Envy, perhaps.  Or longing. 

Aedion made his rounds, Raedan joining him.  Cathal watched from his seat with a cluster of the Bane, sipping from his tankard and monitoring the amount of ale Aedion poured down his throat with increasing incredulity.   After an hour, the King and Queen rose and the hall fell silent while they disappeared through the curtained door behind the daias and then Aedion was before him.

The ale had done little to quench the rage burning through him, that much was obvious at a glance.  “My Bane!” he called out, and his men—their men—leaped to their feet. The Adarlanian soldiers present did the same, Cathal noted with amusement.  “The King wishes us to take our pleasure in the city.” A cheer went up, then the rhythmic stomping of feet until the room shook. “Let us make our people proud!”

With that he turned, Cathal, Raedan, and Kelso flanking him, and led the soldiers from the hall out into the gardens.  Even though night had fallen, the air was dense and cloying, the perfume from the flowers almost suffocating. The streets when they reached them were little better, though a faint breeze brought salt from the sea. Everywhere, lights shone out, and people left their homes to join the soldiers on the streets. Soon they filled taverns up and down the main street and surrounding the market square.

Aedion wound his way through one after the other, toasting his men at each one.  When they finally finished at the Golden Pony, he turned to Cathal with edged weariness.  They walked back to their inn in silence, each step seeming to soothe his brittleness a little bit more.  When they got back to their room he barely got the door locked before Aedion had pressed him up against it, taking his mouth with gentle desperation.

Cathal let himself be lost in the kiss; minutes or hours or days might have passed, consumed by the scent and the taste of him, the hitches of breath, the feel of his lips, his tongue, his teeth.  When they finally broke apart Aedion dropped his head to rest his forehead on Cathal’s. 

He could have stood there for an eternity, sharing breaths, fingers tangled in Aedion’s hair.

But he could not let them forget.  Every moment in this city was rife with danger, and Aedion had been playing the most dangerous game of all.  “What happened tonight?” he murmured, the words barely audible to his own ears. 

Aedion sighed.  “I got it, at least.”  His hand went to the hilt of the ancient sword.  “The rest…” He waved his hand dismissively, but there was a strain to his quiet voice.  “Let’s just say the King’s court is filled with fools, but it was made clear that I am expected to...serve them.”

Cathal drew back to study Aedion’s face.  He looked ancient. Exhausted. Fury seared through him, turning the world red at the edges of his vision.  For a few seconds, everything was frighteningly clear. It was fortunate that the King was half a mile away, safe in his glass castle with a hundred guards between them.

“And how do you feel about that?”

Aedion’s mouth quirked up a fraction.  “It could be worse.” He huffed, almost a laugh.  “I don’t know. As long as I get to choose the people, I suppose I’d rather fuck them than kill them.  Though it won’t surprise me if I’m expected to do both.” He drew Cathal in for another kiss. “I just...you…”

Understanding washed over Cathal and he rested his palm on Aedion’s chest, feeling the steady rhythm of his too-generous heart.  “Aedion, you can bed whoever you want to bed, as long as it is your choice I won’t care.” He didn’t add that if it was not by choice, Cathal’s dagger would be getting some exercise.  

“Mmm.  And if it’s you I want to bed?” Aedion asked against his lips.  “What then?”

“Then what are you waiting for?”

*****

There was some part of Aedion that would never tire of this.  Every inch of Cathal’s body was as familiar to him as his own, yet it was always somehow new.  He loved this; the losing of himself so completely, of his own pleasure and Cathal’s intertwined as their fingers were.  When he was swept up in this, it was easy to let everything else fall away, to pretend the world ended at the door of the room, that they were alone in the universe, a beginning and an end unto themselves.

There was magic to it, somehow.  He understood now why this type of joining was part of so many long-forgotten rituals, why people thousands of years ago had built up whole religions around this communion.  

Aedion slowed his rhythm, watching as Cathal’s eyes fluttered shut.

“Switch with me,” he murmured, leaning down to brush his lips against Cathal’s neck.

Cathal blinked up at him.  “I’m not fucking you for the first time out of some retribution to the King.”

Aedion brushed a kiss to the corner of his lips next.  “That’s not why. Not entirely. I just…” He faltered and Cathal pushed up onto his elbows.  “I want to be clear, in my head, that I belong to you. Not to him. Not to any of the people I might fuck, just you.”

Cathal reached up to cup his cheek, drawing him back down into a deeper kiss.  Aedion let everything else go in the sweep of Cathal’s tongue against his and he wondered if he had ever been more eager to surrender.

The feel of Cathal’s oiled fingers against him and in him was welcome; he let his body open to him as Cathal’s clever tongue teased his nipples and made its way down his body, lingering over the jagged slash below his navel.  As Cathal opened him up, stroking that spot that made him nearly bow off the bed, he said, quietly but clearly, “I just want to make sure you understand one thing.”

Aedion gasped something out that might have been a yes, might have been a whine at the sudden loss of Cathal’s fingers; even he didn’t know.

“You know that I love you, with every fiber of my being.”  The broad head of his cock brushed Aedion’s entrance as their lips met again.  “You may belong  _ with _ me, but you belong to nobody but yourself.”  

A part of Aedion wanted to protest; it seemed easier, somehow, to turn himself over to Cathal.  But a smaller, deeper part would rebel against that. The one he truly belonged to was lost to an icy river, long ago, and he loved Cathal all the more for somehow knowing.

Cathal moved slowly, letting Aedion adjust to the intrusion, his lips and his hands grounding him, keeping him from slipping away into memories.  The stretch quickly turned to unexpected pleasure, different than fingers, but there came no urge to fight it. No; Cathal was as gentle as he could be fierce, and he drew out noises from Aedion’s mouth that should have been mortifying, if only Aedion could find it in him to care.  

It felt like an age that his climax built, sparking at the base of his spine like struck flint, each flash brighter and hotter until he felt like his whole body was alight.  His hand found his cock almost by accident, and he felt Cathal’s short laugh against his neck at the moan he let out. When he finally went over the edge it was as if lightning tore through him, leaving him limp and crackling; a calloused hand tracing up his ribs had every nerve sending tiny jolts through his body.

He came back to himself slowly, taking stock of how he felt.  Wrung out, mostly; the faint ache barely registering beneath the bone-deep relaxation that was pulling him towards sleep.  Cathal cleaned him up gently, then slid into the bed with him. Aedion curled up against his chest, the steady rise and fall of his chest lulling him until everything faded.  And when he woke up to the rosy light of dawn, he realized that no nightmares had touched his sleep.

*****

Delaney let herself into her apartment and was greeted by Cherise wearing an elaborate gown, Maida capering around her.  Cherise grabbed her hands and dragged her into their room and pointed at a similar dress laid out on the bed. “Freshen up and change, then I’ll do your hair.”

Delany touched the fine fabric of the dress, running her finger over the delicate embroidery.  “I’m not sure I want to see him like that the first time. In front of all those people?”

“But this is all you’ve been talking about for days.  Are you really going to back out on me now? It may be your only opportunity.”

True.  Delaney quickly washed the fine powder of flour off her skin and dressed.  Cherise buttoned her in then sat her in a chair and began on her hair. 

“I still don’t know why we can’t come,” Maida pouted.

“You’re too young,” Cherise said firmly.  

Delaney wondered when Maida would tire of the argument; it had been going on for days.   

“But I want to see him.”

“Later,” Delaney said.  “Didn’t I promise you I’d figure it out?”

“Yes,” Maida replied, all fire going out of her at once.  Delaney brushed a hand over her hair. 

“Besides, don’t you want him to yourself?  At the party we’re going to have to share.”  

“I guess.”  The sigh Maida heaved belonged to a crone ten times her age.  Delaney smothered her smile and Cherise turned the topic toward one of Maida’s friends from school who had invited her to spend the night.

Several hours later, Delaney was standing by the wall talking to a handful of Cherise’s friends while the wealthy danced nearby.  There had been no sign of Aedion or any of the Terrasen soldiers. Delaney wondered if she’d know any of the others; she had met a few former members of the Bane while living with Clery, but had no way of knowing if they had joined Aedion or fought against him.  Maybe if she ran into one of them she could send a message to Aedion.

“Excuse me,” came a voice behind her.  She froze; the voice was like an imitation of the one she had known—deeper and rounder—but the accent… “May I have this dance?”

She turned slowly, and he was there.  Aedion, but not quite  _ her _ Aedion.  Taller and broader, hair longer, a new small scar on his jaw.  It was his eyes that arrested her: they could never belong to anyone else, not with their stunning color, but they had aged far more than the two and a half years that had passed.  Abruptly she remembered the last time she had seen them, wracked with pain, and shame and guilt dropped into her stomach like lead. Reaching for her voice, she found herself unable to speak, but she held her hand out to him and he took it.  A new song was beginning, and he led her out among the twirling couples. “Do you even know how to dance?” she finally got out as they stopped and faced each other. She hated that those were her first words to him, but he grinned at her. It wasn’t quite the grin she remembered but close enough.  

“Yes, the northern heathen knows how to dance.”  She chuckled weakly and he pulled her against him.  He wasn’t lying; he did know how to dance, and she let herself follow him while she tried to swallow down the tears.  “I seem to recall you being more talkative,” he said, as they settled into a rhythm.

“I seem to recall you being more awkward,” she replied.

“Ah, there’s my girl.”  He spun her around, and just like that the years apart fell away.  He was her boy again, her friend, her brother in all but blood. They might have been hiding in the stables, pouring their hearts out to each other while Aedion brushed that gray mare.  “How is Rifthold treating you?” he asked, and she could hear the concern underneath the lightness.

“Well enough.”  She had to crane her neck to look at him.  “What do you think so far?”

“I’m overwhelmed by its riches and luxuries,” he said dryly.

“I’m sure,” she said, thinking about Orynth.  Though she had made a home here, she still missed the beauty of the white city.  Even the poorest parts still had dignity, in a way the slums here never would. She glanced at Cherise, who was talking with a man she vaguely recognized from Orynth.  One of Aedion’s, then. 

He saw where she was looking.  “Your friend will be fine with Cathal,” he said.  

“Cherise can take care of herself,” Delaney answered.

Aedion grinned.  “Perhaps not just a friend?”

She rolled her eyes.  “Definitely not just a friend.”

His grin widened.  “Good.”

“Where is Raedan?” she asked.

“He’s stuck at some other party.  We split up to try to find you, you see. I’m damn lucky Cathal picked this one.”

The song ended and all the dancers bowed to each other, but Aedion did not release her.  “We can dance for one more.”

There was a line of women eyeing them.  Well, him, really, not that Delaney could blame them.  “I think there may be rioting.”

“I don’t care about them.”

“Yes, well, you shouldn’t care about me, either,” she murmured.  

“Too late,” he said, as the music started again.  As they twirled across the floor, she couldn’t help but laugh.  

“You need to find a way to visit,” she said.  “Raedan too. My sisters will never forgive you if you don’t.”

“Avis and Maida are here?”

“Yes, they have been for months.”

“And they’re all right?”

“Yes.”  It wasn’t completely true, at least not with Avis, but close enough.

“I can’t believe it,” he whispered, barely audible over the music.  “We’ll make it work, somehow.”

It was as good as an oath.

*****

Cathal thought Raedan’s sister looked like she was going to faint when Aedion led her away.  Her companion watched them, a smile playing on her lips but intelligent sharpness in her eyes.  When she felt him studying her, she turned to face him. “So why do you accompany the good general tonight?  Are you his bodyguard?” she asked, tone deceptively playful.

“Yes,” he answered.  He had no interest in playing verbal games, not after five days of steady bullshit.  Even if Adarlan hadn’t conquered he would have hated this city, with its constant parties and dancing and fancy clothes that did nothing to cover up the rot in its heart.

“I would have thought he was too skilled to need such help.  Rifthold seems to think he is a god among men.”

“Is there anyone, even a god, who would not benefit from someone to watch their back?”

“I was joking.”

“I am well aware,” Cathal retorted.  “But I wasn’t.”

“Is there no such thing as a sense of humor in the north?” she asked archly.  “Too cold for it?”

“Does this flirtation thing you do actually work to trick people into thinking you’re a harmless fool?”

She gave a startled laugh.  “Yes, usually.”

He could see the benefits of it; being underestimated was almost never a bad thing.  Raedan was adamant it was how the King of Adarlan had taken over half the continent, and he was probably right.  But he was going to have to watch this girl, especially if she was as close to Raedan’s sister as it appeared.

“What’s your name, Captain?” 

“Rosach.”

“Well, Captain Rosach, I’m Cherise.  I imagine we will be seeing quite a lot more of each other.”

He made a noncommittal noise at that and turned back to Aedion.  A minute passed, then Cherise said, “I understand the general is not partaking in Rifthold’s pleasures.”  Cathal looked at her, working to keep his face neutral. “Rumor has it he would have had his pick of ladies the past couple of nights, yet went home alone.”

“Perhaps no one caught his fancy.”

“Or perhaps someone is already sharing his bed.”  

Yes, he was definitely right to keep a careful eye on this girl, with the knowing look she was giving him.  He wondered what had given him away, or if it was pure conjecture on her part. “It would not surprise me if the ladies in question were overestimating their charms.”

She laughed for real at that.  “Oh, Captain, I do think we shall be friends.”

“I sincerely hope not,” he replied.  She merely laughed again.

Raedan’s sister returned to them then, cheeks flushed and a pretty smile on her lips.  “Cherise, have you been bothering the officer?”

“Most definitely,” Cathal answered.  He gave her a short bow. “Cathal Rosach, at your service.”

“Delaney,” she said. 

“Wait,” Cherise said, “how come you’re at her service?  You didn’t offer that to me.”

“Why would he?” Delaney asked.  “You’re not his general’s oldest friend.”

Cathal debated whether to tell her she wasn’t either—Conor Shaw had known Aedion most of his life—but opted against it.  “I sincerely doubt you’d ever be in need of my assistance.”

“I like him,” Cherise said to Delaney.  “Can we keep him? We need a new pet.”

“I think Aedion would have something to say about that, darling.”  Cathal glanced at her, wondering what Aedion had said about him. He was still out on the floor, dancing with some fluttery girl.  Cathal could see the faint annoyance in his eyes but doubted anyone else would notice. Except Delaney was watching too, and she chuckled quietly, a very familiar gleam in her gray-green eyes.  

“You really are Raedan’s sister, aren’t you,” he said.  

“So my mother always told us.”  She gave him a sly smile and he found himself unexpectedly wanting to smile back.   _ So this is Aedion’s family _ , he thought.  The living one he had built after the other had been destroyed.  This was who Aedion had survived for. He felt an absurd urge to thank her, and forced himself to turn back to face the dancers before he made a fool of himself.

*****

Aedion breathed a sigh of relief that that the longest song in the history of music was finally finished.  He released the girl who had been gushing inanely at him and tried not to grimace when she linked arms with him as he practically fled off the dance floor.  He pried her hand off of him as he returned her to her friends with a shallow sketch of a bow.

Only five nights in, and he kept finding himself wondering how the hell these pompous idiots had effectively conquered two thirds of a continent.

Not that he didn’t know the answer.  The King, for all his arrogance and the reek of rot and decaying blood that emanated from him, was a brilliant strategist.  The morning meetings with his military personnel were efficient, and Aedion was pretty certain only the King and the Duke were present for all of them.  Nobody else knew the full breadth of his plans, not even his son.

Prince Dorian had been there that morning for Aedion’s meeting, and had been dismissed at the same time.  Aedion found his indolent presence more of an annoyance than anything; the prince ignored the majority of the discussion, glanced briefly at the maps, then had the audacity to stare at Aedion every time he spoke.  Aedion wondered if he remembered that dinner all those years ago. Maybe it was forgettable to him; after all, it was just another dinner before just another assassination of a ruler, another invasion of a country, another systematic destruction of lives. 

Aedion glanced around the people dancing and drinking and gossiping in their fanciest clothes.  For just a second, he allowed himself to imagine Aelin, alive, with her magic free, and all this ridiculous pageantry going up in flames.  The chattering girl he had been dancing with would look particularly good screaming with her hair alight…

Delaney’s voice brought him back to the present.  “I should have warned you away from her, she’s awful.”

He grimaced.  “I’ve met a few like her since I’ve been here.”

Delaney’s lover—Cherise, he thought her name was—made a face.  “Yes, there’s more than enough of them to go around. Unfortunately the lordlings around here think that sort of idiotic foppery is charming.”

“The men I have met have been little different,” Cathal said.  

Cherise laughed, and did not deny it.  The man Aedion had been introduced to as the host approached.  “I see you’ve met my daughter, General,” Bohun said solicitously.  “I hope she’s been behaving herself.”

Cathal’s eyebrows shot up but he kept his mouth shut.  “She hasn’t stripped off her clothes yet, if that’s what you mean,” Aedion said.

Bohun looked shocked at the statement, but Aedion knew it was a farce.  He had all but offered his daughter up as a present during their introduction.  Aedion had been faintly nauseated at the insinuation before; now, cold rage crept through his veins.  He had no use for the pretense of propriety as a veneer over whoring one’s own child. A glance at Cherise showed little change in expression; the same amusement played around her mouth, the same sharpness lit her eyes.  Her father babbled for a moment then excused himself, nearly running in his haste to escape the soldiers who were looming over him.

Delaney’s eyes were downcast, and Cathal still looked furious when Aedion turned to Cherise.  “Well, I was going to ask you to dance next, but I assure you I do not expect you to undress.”

“It would make the evening a bit more exciting,” she said.  

“True.  But I’m not sure Rifthold is ready for that sort of excitement.”

“Oh, darling, you definitely have not spent enough time here yet.”

He laughed.  “Do you want to dance?”

“No,” she said.  “I want you to agree to come to dinner.  And bring Delaney’s brother, and this fine Captain here even if he refuses to service me.”

Aedion choked on his own spit.  “Excuse me?” Delaney and Cherise both dissolved into laughter; even Cathal was amused, but nobody bothered to explain the joke.

When they finally left well past midnight, they had arrangements to meet Delaney and her sisters—and Cherise—for dinner.  Aedion didn’t know if he believed in luck, it felt too much like trusting the forsaking gods, but he believed in Delaney and that was enough.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I sincerely hope the rest of the time in Rifthold is easier for me to write, lol. I have the rest of this plotted out, and even if it takes me forever it's going to be finished. Hopefully there won't be another hiatus this long, and thank you to everyone who has stuck it out! I won't lie, the comments from you guys, including those of you new to this fic, are part of what kept me going here when Aedion and Delaney just refused to behave. So thank you!


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